During the trial for disgraced crypto-wunderkind Sam Bankman-Fried , the courtroom artist did an inspired, almost abstract evocation of his parents at the moment of the crushing verdict.
His father is bent over, white head in his hands, his mother is covering her face; the shadowing of their dark clothes merges them into a single mountain of unspeakable grief.
Journalists in the room were equally riveted by their reaction, writing about Barbara Fried “crumpling” and Joe Bankman “doubling over” and of them “holding each other up.” Covering their faces would not shield them from the intense scrutiny aimed in their direction.
As Stanford law professors, they are an unlikely couple to be watching their son remove his tie and shoelaces as he is taken off to jail.
Fried taught legal ethics, and Bankman has focused on financial regulation—details that would seem a little heavy-handed in their irony if they were in a novel someone was writing.
Persons:
Sam Bankman, Barbara Fried, ”, Joe Bankman “, Fried, Bankman
Organizations:
Journalists, Stanford