Welcome to the SBF trial, a Coin Desk Podcast Network newsletter bringing you daily insights from inside the courtroom where Sam Bankman-Fried will try to stay out of prison.

Follow the CoinDesk podcast network to get the audio each morning with content from the Coin Desk Regulation Team and voiced by Wondercraft AI. After multiple consecutive setbacks

for the former FTX CEO and his defense team, Judge Lewis Kaplan seemed to have been in a

slightly more generous mood yesterday. The once celebrated Cryptomated crypto-mogal will be able to use

an air-gapped laptop to take notes while in court during the entirety of his trial, which starts

October 3rd in New York City, the judge said in a ruling. We will spare you the Google search for what

that means. Since the laptop is air-gapped, Bankman-Fried will have no connection to the internet or local area networks.

The computer is physically isolated from unsecured networks, which also means that data can only be

uploaded through the computer via USB and the like. In other words, Bankman-Freed will have no way of

messaging with reporters or attempting to contact witnesses. All he is able to do is take notes.

Judge Kaplan also ruled that Bankman Fried can wear suits in the courthouse, as opposed to

his prison uniform, which he had worn to some court hearings since being remanded into custody

in August.

This may help with potential bias from jurors who might unconsciously perceive the FTX founder

as an already

convicted criminal just by his look if he wore the beige prison garb. Even though this week marked three

wins for Bankman Fried's team, Judge Kaplan on Tuesday said he will let Bankman Fried's lawyers ask

some of the Department of Justice's witnesses about their recreational drug use and other questions

tied to their running of FTX and Alameda research. These motions seem to be a lot less

significant than some of the requests that the defense team had filed that had been denied.

Bankman-Fried's lawyers, for example, are still fighting to release the FTX founder for the

duration of his trial

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