Grant recipients didn’t scrub any toilets or empty any trash cans at FTX. Instead, grant recipients were given a gift of money from FTX. This is another example of misdirection and searching around for a rationalization to keep the tainted grant money, it is an unseemly form of what-aboutism.
I would push back against this. Grant recipients were given money to carry out a job. They were not given money unconditionally, which is what a gift is. So I think you still need to spell out the underlying principle here.
Well, if doing the right thing isn’t enough in itself to convince grant recipients (see ARC’s commendable statement that they are returning their $1.25 million grant) then how about wanting to stay out of prison.
Right now FTX grant recipients are relying on the fig leaf that FTX and/or its former executives have not yet been been charged or convicted of criminally defrauding (embezzling from) FTX’s depositors.
But even at this point grant recipients are on notice that their grant money likely was stolen funds. If criminal convictions are obtained, this will be cemented—the money is stolen property.
Therefore, grant recipients who possess stolen funds (grants from FTX made with stolen money) are on the cusp of potentially committing a crime themselves if they refuse to return it—the crime of retaining known stolen property. It matters not that they did not know at the time they received it that it was stolen. They know now and yet are retaining the money rather than returning the money to its rightful owners.
In many jurisdictions retaining know stolen property is a crime (not talking about receiving stolen property—there you do have to know at the time you received it that it was stolen; talking about retaining known stolen property once you know it is stolen—that is an independent crime). Look for example at Model Penal Code 223.6(1) “A person is guilty of theft if he purposely … retains or disposes of … property of another knowing that it has been stolen, or believing that it probably has been stolen, unless the property is … retained, or disposed with purpose to restore it to the owner.”
Imagine you are a grant recipient, and in two years are in court trying to explain why you kept the grant money and then spent it, after you were on notice that it was likely stolen funds.
Right now there is a window where people can freely choose to do the right thing, or not. That window will likely close, and then the discussion will reduce to return the money or potentially commit a crime and go to jail.
(Again, I have have never owned or speculated in any cryptocurrency, and I have no connections whatsoever with FTX or any crypto business—I do not have a dog in this fight.)
I would push back against this. Grant recipients were given money to carry out a job. They were not given money unconditionally, which is what a gift is. So I think you still need to spell out the underlying principle here.
Well, if doing the right thing isn’t enough in itself to convince grant recipients (see ARC’s commendable statement that they are returning their $1.25 million grant) then how about wanting to stay out of prison.
Right now FTX grant recipients are relying on the fig leaf that FTX and/or its former executives have not yet been been charged or convicted of criminally defrauding (embezzling from) FTX’s depositors.
But even at this point grant recipients are on notice that their grant money likely was stolen funds. If criminal convictions are obtained, this will be cemented—the money is stolen property.
Therefore, grant recipients who possess stolen funds (grants from FTX made with stolen money) are on the cusp of potentially committing a crime themselves if they refuse to return it—the crime of retaining known stolen property. It matters not that they did not know at the time they received it that it was stolen. They know now and yet are retaining the money rather than returning the money to its rightful owners.
In many jurisdictions retaining know stolen property is a crime (not talking about receiving stolen property—there you do have to know at the time you received it that it was stolen; talking about retaining known stolen property once you know it is stolen—that is an independent crime). Look for example at Model Penal Code 223.6(1) “A person is guilty of theft if he purposely … retains or disposes of … property of another knowing that it has been stolen, or believing that it probably has been stolen, unless the property is … retained, or disposed with purpose to restore it to the owner.”
Imagine you are a grant recipient, and in two years are in court trying to explain why you kept the grant money and then spent it, after you were on notice that it was likely stolen funds.
Right now there is a window where people can freely choose to do the right thing, or not. That window will likely close, and then the discussion will reduce to return the money or potentially commit a crime and go to jail.
(Again, I have have never owned or speculated in any cryptocurrency, and I have no connections whatsoever with FTX or any crypto business—I do not have a dog in this fight.)