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Fortune
Fortune
Ben Weiss

Is Sam Bankman-Fried a bad ‘man’ or a good ‘boy’? Lawyers swap opening statements before first witnesses take the stand

Damian Williams, U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, left, exits the courthouse where Sam Bankman-Fried is being tried. (Credit: Yuki Iwamura—Bloomberg/Getty Images)

Who is Sam Bankman-Fried, the former CEO of the crypto exchange FTX? Is he a liar and a fraud? Or did he act in good faith, and like many a startup founder, fly too close to the sun?

That answer ultimately lies with the jury, which was selected on Wednesday morning before lawyers for the government and then Bankman-Fried swapped two very different stories of the former crypto mogul’s sudden rise and almost instantaneous fall.

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