By Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon Substack
SDNY COURTHOUSE, April 11 – In the wake of the Archegos meltdown, the other shoe dropped on April 27, when the US Attorney for the SDNY unsealed and indictment charging Bill Hwang Patrick Halligan, Archegos’s CFO with racketeering conspiracy, securities fraud, and wire fraud offenses.
On June 1, newly assigned District Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein held a conference in the case. Inner City Press attended and live tweet it here (and asked defense counsel a question later, here
Jump cut to November 14, 2023 when Judge Hellerstein held an oral argument on the subpoena requests. Inner City Press attended, in mask, and tweeted, threadette
On January 3, 2024, still mostly masked, Judge Hellerstein said the proposed experts are qualified, that sufficient notice is the issue. He said he will follow Judge Jed Rakoff's decision in US v. Mrabet, which Inner City Press also covered. At the end Judge Hellerstein said, with a laugh, Don't settle this case, I want to try it.
On January 8 Hwang's counsel filed a motion to exclude 16 gigabytes of trading data they say should have been produced to them 17 months ago - and email notes of previous counsel's communications with the prosecutors, on Patreon here.
On January 22, Judge Hellerstein pushed the trial back to May 6: "ORDER as to Sung Kook (Bill) Hwang, Patrick Halligan. The start of trial in the above-captioned case is adjourned to May 6, 2024 at 10:00 a.m. The final pre-trial conference is adjourned to April 16, 2024 at 2:30 p.m."
In fact, the FPTC was on April 11. Inner City Press was there, thread:
OK - now at US v. Bill Hwang / Archegos final pre-trial conference, Judge Hellerstein asking prosecutors why they didn't do what he ordered -
AUSA: We expect Mr. Becker to testify how he was trained to lie to banks. How much better notice can we give? Judge Hellerstein: You better do a better job. I don't want this. I can't fight with you about what I said, because I don't remember what I said.
Judge Hellerstein: I'm trying to make this trial a little fairer. AUSA: This is not hide the ball. We've given them disclosure earlier than usual. Judge Hellerstein: You deserve a gold medal? AUSA: We'll put it in a letter. Judge: Make it specific
Defense: We'd like a date certain for this... They are alleging misleading communications in 2020 and 2021 to facilitate manipulative trading in 2020 and 2021. But whatever came before is not relevant, including these supposed communications to banks
Defense: They have marked a 2018 credit memo for the Wells Fargo Bank - would you like to see it? I have paper copies... This is Exhibit B to ECF 168-G. October 2018, it indicates Wells conducted due diligence in May and July 2018
Judge Hellerstein: I don't know what's going on. There is no signature. To whom at Archegos can it be attributed? AUSA: This is a business record of Wells Fargo -
Judge Hellerstein: This is the kind of thing you need to disclose.
***
Your support means a lot. As little as $5 a month helps keep us going and grants you access to exclusive bonus material on our Patreon page. Click here to become a patron.
Feedback: Editorial [at] innercitypress.com
