Courtroom sketches of disgraced crypto entrepreneur Sam Bankman-Fried and his ex-business associate Caroline Ellison are making rounds on social media, with many quipping that it looked like the artist held a personal grudge.
“Starting to think some of these courtroom sketch artists lost money on FTX,” posted web3 observer Molly White, alongside the pair of images.
“the courtroom sketch artist lost a shit ton of money in FTX, im sure of it,” agreed another user on X.
Even Elon Musk weighed in, voicing his agreement. “Sure seems like it,” he replied.
Others took cracks at the pair’s appearance in the sketches.
“Looks like the scream,” joked Molly Jong-Fast, referencing Edvard Munch’s 1893 painting.
“SBF looks like a Geico Caveman,” wrote someone else.
“Courtroom sketch of Caroline during the FTX trials goes hard, ngl,” one user wrote of a separate sketch of Ellison.
“If a courtroom sketch is ever made of me, i hope to look way hotter than this,” posted Reason associate editor Liz Wolfe.
Ellison, the former CEO of Bankman-Fried’s hedge fund Alameda Research, testified on Tuesday that Bankman-Fried—who is also her ex-boyfriend—directed her and others to defraud FTX clients by taking and using about $10 million in customer funds without their knowledge.
“He was the one who set up these systems that allowed Alameda to take the money and he was the one who directed us to take customer money to repay our loans,” Ellison testified.
She added in her testimony that she is “truly sorry for what I did” and “knew that it was wrong.”
Prosecutors allege Bankman-Fried illegally siphoned customer funds from FTX to financially support Alameda, make real estate purchases, and donate more than $100 million to U.S. political campaigns.
FTX collapsed in November 2022 after a CoinDesk report highlighted solvency concerns involving Alameda. In March of this year, FTX said it couldn’t account for $8.9 billion in customer funds.
Bankman-Fried has pled not guilty to two counts of fraud and five counts of conspiracy. He has been in jail since August after the judge sided with prosecutors who alleged witness tampering efforts.
If Bankman-Fried is found guilty of all seven criminal counts, the maximum sentence he faces is 110 years in prison.
