According to Matthew Lee, the one-man band behind Inner City Press, the atmosphere in the courtroom for Celsius founder Alex Mashinsky’s case is kind of “meh” compared with FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried’s more dramatic trial.
But Lee reckons that might work in Mashinsky’s favor, potentially leading to a lighter sentence. The disgraced former Celsius boss faces a similar number of fraud charges than SBF did, along with a possible sentence of many decades in prison, in a trial set for later this year.
“He seems more of an older, more solid guy. I know there’s a lot of people that don’t like him but it’s a different vibe,” he says of Mashinsky, adding that his whole aura is a “lot less flashy.”
Lee says Mashinsky is “like many white-collar defendants.” He casually strolls into the courtroom without much attention from the public except for the Celsius victims online, of course. They are pretty keen to know WTF is going on with their funds.
All of this is the complete opposite of Bankman-Fried, according to Lee:
“There’s something uniquely in your face about the Bankman-Fried approach that I think is gonna give him a higher number [of years] than Mashinsky.”
Lee is the beating heart of Inner City Press, which may look like a blog from 1996 that fell through a wormhole in time, but which gained a big audience thanks to its top-notch court coverage. He’s attended every court hearing for Bankman-Fried and Mashinsky over the past year.
His live tweeting of the hearings became a hit in the crypto industry and has garnered him 257,400 followers on X.
One of the major differences he has noticed is the paparazzi frenzy surrounding Bankman-Fried compared to the relatively low-key attention Mashinsky receives.
There aren’t a “bunch of photographers” waiting for him like there are for Bankman-Fried and his curly locks.
Lee’s got a skill for spotting the smallest details in the courthouse that others might overlook.
He picked up silly errors that Bankman-Fried made throughout the trial and claims that one reason he stumbled in front of the jury was due to him being “so arrogant.”
“He was correcting the grammar of questions, and I don’t think that did him any good with the jurors.”
How did you achieve Twitter fame?
Lee launched Inner City Press back in 1987, 37 years ago now, so he’s been around the block.
From Donald Trump’s recent criminal trial to a case involving the former president of Honduras being accused of collecting bribes from violent drug cartels, he’s on the front lines covering New York’s legal dramas.
Lee says that his following has grown steadily over the years because he maintains impartiality while still providing readers insights into little quirks unfolding in the courtroom beyond the dialogue.
“I think what I try to do is a lot even in those Trump cases people are always like ‘you should just say he’s terrible’. I think I try to just get the dialogue as it is.”
Lee’s recent content of courtroom dramas involving one-time crypto titans like Mashinsky, Bankman-Fried, and Terraform Labs’ Do Kwon has seen crypto enthusiasts flock to Lee’s account to be first to get the real-time court updates.
Luckily, Lee finds crypto legal battles to be among the “more interesting ones.”
What type of content do you do?
Lee explains that if you’re into crypto and law and the latest crazy fraud scandals unfolding in real-time, then his account is right up your alley.
“I’m not following the overnight price of Bitcoin. So they’ll never find that here,” he says.
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“They will not find promotion of any particular coin. I’m not saying people shouldn’t want to find that. I’m just saying they won’t find that on Inner City Press,” he adds.
What you will find, though, is that if there’s a crypto trial going down in New York, Lee is likely to have it covered.
“I do my best to cover them, particularly if they’re here in New York. I can’t cover them in person if they’re elsewhere like the CZ thing in Washington state,” he explains.
He still does try to cover the big cases elsewhere, he just has to hustle a bit more to get those courthouse filings early to have content ready for his readers.
“I get a lot of the filings very early, but a lot of them come sealed. So, I try to get some stuff unsealed.”
What type of content do you like?
Lee says he keeps an eye on all the crypto news sites to stay in the loop with the fast-paced and sometimes chaotic world of crypto.
“There’s a list that I follow on Twitter of all crypto news sites,” he explains.
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But Lee won’t name specific crypto leaders he’s a fan of in the industry, likely because he’s afraid they might end up like the next Bankman-Fried or Mashinsky.
“There are many individuals, it’s not as if I’m withholding any blessings or anything,” he laughs.
Predictions?
Lee forecasts that former Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao will spend some time behind bars, but it won’t be anything like Mashinsky and Bankman-Fried.
“I think he’s [CZ] gonna do some time but it’s not going to be anything like with the Sam Bankman-Fried sentence, and the proof of that is that he seems to be putting out new ideas of what he’s going to do,” he explains.
As for Bankman-Fried, although the U.S. government is pushing for a half-century sentence, Lee believes it could end up being a lot less than that.
He thinks this is because Bankman-Fried’s new lawyers, Marc Mukasey and Torrey Young, are “much more aggressive” than the previous ones.
“I think it’ll be more than 10 [years] but I don’t know how much more than 10.”
Lee invites everyone to join his X account on Bankman-Fried’s sentencing date this week, March 28, where he guarantees to deliver all the juicy updates right in the thick of it all.
“Unless there’s a hurricane. I will be live tweeting it in its full glory,” he laughs.
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Ciaran Lyons
Ciaran Lyons is an Australian crypto journalist. He’s also a standup comedian and has been a radio and TV presenter on Triple J, SBS and The Project.
