Miller, Paschal Interviewed by Reuters on Potential Defense in SBF’s Criminal Case and Implications for Civil Defendant Fenwick & West

Partner Kerry Miller was interviewed by Reuters for the article “Bankman-Fried hints at blame-the-lawyers defense in criminal case,” which was published on May 31, 2023. The piece explores the potential advice of counsel defense implied by FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried’s request for access to documents from Fenwick & West, the law firm that represented the company and its subsidiaries prior to its collapse. Hogan Paschal, an attorney in Fishman Haygood’s Litigation Section, was also interviewed for the article. Click here to read the story.

On Feb. 22, 2023, Fishman Haygood and Stumphauzer Kolaya Nadler & Sloman filed the most comprehensive class action lawsuit to date on behalf of FTX customers. The lawsuit seeks to recover damages in the form of investment losses against the banks, venture capital firms, accounting firms, and law firm that allegedly aided and abetted Bankman-Fried and his company in a scheme to defraud customers out of billions of dollars and crypto assets. Fenwick & West is named as a defendant in the suit, which alleges that the law firm helped to create the sham companies through which Bankman-Fried perpetuated the fraud and orchestrated FTX’s regulatory subterfuge so that the fraud could continue, undetected.

In April, Miller and Paschal discussed the key takeaways from an interim report filed by FTX’s current CEO John R. Ray III in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware following the company’s Chapter 11 filing last November. Click to read their analysis.

Fishman Haygood represents both plaintiffs and defendants in class action and mass action litigation, both in Louisiana and across the nation. Read more about the firm’s FTX suit here.