Sam Bankman-Fried sent to ‘notoriously hard’ prison in California

The Federal Bureau of Prisons transferred Sam Bankman-Fried to a prison in California as of Wednesday, according to the BOP’s inmate database. The disgraced founder of the failed crypto exchange FTX was previously in Oklahoma for about two weeks from late March through April at a federal transit center for prisoners. Before then, he resided in Brooklyn’s Metropolitan Detention Center. Now, he is at one of two federal, medium-security prisons for men in Victorville, a small city east of Los Angeles.

“He’s gone from a five-star hotel down to a one-star hotel,” Larry Levine, a federal prison consultant and former inmate, told Fortune, comparing Bankman-Fried’s accommodations in Brooklyn to those in Victorville. “It’s that much of a difference.”

Kyle Sandler, a prison consultant who was released from federal custody a year ago, echoed Levine and said Victorville was a “notoriously hard” federal prison. “He’s in real prison now,” he added.

In 2014, the District of Columbia Corrections Information Council, an oversight organization that monitors the prisons in which inmates from D.C. are detained, reported that Victorville prisoners witnessed high levels of violence, including gang-related deaths and assaults. 

A spokesperson for the BOP declined to say whether the prison in the California city is Bankman-Fried’s long-term destination and didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the prison’s conditions. Levine guessed that Victorville was Bankman-Fried’s home for the foreseeable future. “It looks like he has been designated,” he said.

Lawyers for Bankman-Fried did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The arrival of the onetime crypto mogul in California potentially puts an end to speculation on where Bankman-Fried would reside after a federal judge sentenced him to 25 years in prison in March 2024. A jury previously found the former CEO guilty of fraud for siphoning more than $8 billion of customer funds from his crypto exchange in one of the largest financial crimes in U.S. history.  

Throughout his trial, Bankman-Fried had been in a Brooklyn holding facility in a section reserved for high-profile inmates like Sean “Diddy” Combs and Luigi Mangione. The judge presiding over his case recommended that the BOP transfer him to a prison in California to be closer to his parents, who are professors at Stanford University, in the Palo Alto area, about 400 miles north of Victorville.

Bankman-Fried’s lawyers, however, asked for him to remain in Brooklyn as he appealed the jury’s guilty verdict.

In addition to his appeal, Bankman-Fried is reportedly seeking a pardon from President Donald Trump. Before the BOP transferred him from Brooklyn to Oklahoma, the former CEO waged a media blitz in an apparent bid to curry favor with the president. He even conducted an unauthorized video interview from prison with Tucker Carlson, the former Fox News host who now has his own program.

The publicity stunt reportedly landed Bankman-Fried in solitary confinement and may result in further punishments against the onetime crypto wunderkind. 

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com