U.S. prosecutors deny pressuring FTX executives to plead guilty.

[U.S. prosecutors deny pressuring FTX executives to plead guilty] One of the U.S. prosecutors who helped convict former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried, Danielle Sassoon, testified on Thursday at a hearing related to the guilty plea agreement of former FTX Digital Markets co-CEO Ryan Salame. The hearing took place at the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, and the core issue was whether the prosecution had improperly influenced Salame's guilty plea — which ultimately affected the criminal case of his former partner, Michelle Bond. Previously, Salameh was sentenced to over seven years in prison for admitting to campaign finance violations and operating an unlicensed money transmission business. His plea became the focus of Bond's legal team, which claimed that the prosecution “coerced” Salameh into cooperating with the investigation, unfairly exposing Bond to criminal charges. Sassoon denied the claim. It is reported that when Sassoon testified, she stated that if Salameh pleaded guilty, her team “might not continue to investigate [Salameh's] behavior,” but she emphasized that the government did not mislead Salameh regarding possible outcomes. “My job is not to set traps to entice others to plead guilty,” she said.