Ryan Salame, a former top lieutenant of FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried, has been sentenced to 90 months (7.5 years) in prison, followed by three years of supervised release. Salame must also pay over $6 million in forfeiture and more than $5 million in restitution.

The sentence exceeded prosecutors’ recommendation of five to seven years and was far more than the 18 months Salame’s defense team requested.

Salame pleaded guilty in September to conspiracy to make unlawful political contributions, defraud the Federal Election Commission, and conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money-transmitting business.

Judge Lewis Kaplan previously sentenced Bankman-Fried to 25 years in prison in March.

In 2021, Salame transitioned from a high-ranking position at Bankman-Fried’s crypto hedge fund, Alameda Research, to co-CEO of FTX’s Bahamian subsidiary, FTX Digital Markets. During his tenure, he spent millions on real estate and campaign donations.

According to Bahamian lawyers, Bankman-Fried and Salame spent $256.3 million on 35 properties across New Providence. Bahamian regulators seek to recover these assets in FTX’s U.S. bankruptcy proceedings. Federal Election Commission data shows Salame donated over $24 million to Republican candidates and causes in the 2022 election cycle.

Days before FTX filed for bankruptcy in 2022, Salame informed Bahamian authorities about Bankman-Fried’s potential fraud involving the transfer of customer funds from FTX to Alameda Research. This disclosure marked one of the first insider reports against Bankman-Fried, who was later convicted of stealing over $8 billion in customer funds.

Since then, several insiders including Caroline Ellison, Gary Wang, and Nishad Singh, have testified against him, contributing to his guilty verdict in November. Salame did not testify at Bankman-Fried’s trial.

U.S. Attorney Damian Williams stated that Tuesday’s sentence highlighted “the substantial consequences for such offenses,” emphasizing that Salame’s actions undermined public trust in elections and the financial system.

Salame is the first of Bankman-Fried’s executive team to be sentenced since FTX’s bankruptcy in November 2022.