Caroline Ellison’s scheduled prison release moved up, Records Show

  • Caroline Ellison’s scheduled release date from prison appears to have been moved up.
  • She began her two-year sentence for her role in the $11 billion FTX fraud earlier this month.
  • Prison records show her release date is set for July 2026.

Former cryptocurrency executive Caroline Ellison reported to federal prison earlier this month to serve a two-year sentence for her role in the massive multibillion-dollar fraud scheme that led to the collapse of Sam Bankman-Fried’s business empire.

And it appears that Ellison — the ex-girlfriend of Bankman-Fried, the founder of FTX and Alameda Research — has already changed her release date.

Ellison, who was the CEO of Bankman-Fried’s Alameda Research cryptocurrency hedge fund, began her prison sentence at the low-security Danbury Federal Correctional Institution in Connecticut on November 7.

Federal Bureau of Prisons records seen by Business Insider this week show Ellison’s release date from prison as scheduled for July 20, 2026 — that’s more than three months short of two years.

Attorneys for Ellison declined to comment for this story. A spokesman for the Bureau of Prisons told BI that the agency did not comment on the conditions of confinement of any person in custody, including release plans, but said that incarcerated individuals could earn time off their sentences for good behavior under the Act. The First Step of 2018.

“Each incarcerated individual earns Good Conduct Time (GCT), which is due on their release date,” the spokesperson told BI in an email, explaining that under the First Step Act, “eligible individuals will are entitled to earn up to 54 days of GCT Time for each year of the sentence imposed by the court.”

In accordance with federal law, the Bureau of Prisons “continues to assess the amount of GCT earned for the last year of sentence service,” the spokesman said.

Ellison, 30, was sentenced in September after previously pleading guilty to conspiring with Bankman-Fried in the $11 billion fraud scheme.

She served as the star witness in Bankman-Fried’s criminal trial, testifying how the pair used Alameda Research to invest billions of dollars worth of assets secretly amassed by customers of FTX, the collapsed cryptocurrency exchange that Bankman-Fried controlled.

During Ellison’s sentencing hearing, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan praised her for her cooperation in prosecuting Bankman-Fried, but said he could not let her go free.

“You’re a very strong person in some ways. But you’re not invulnerable,” Kaplan told Ellison at the time. “Somehow, for some reason—it’s hard for me to understand—Mr. Bankman-Fried had your kryptonite.”

“You were vulnerable and you were taken advantage of,” Kaplan said.

Ellison’s lawyers had asked the judge not to give her time behind bars because of her cooperation with the government, and prosecutors also praised her cooperation.

But Kaplan said at Ellison’s sentencing that “for it to be such a serious case, for it to be a literal get-out-of-jail-free card — I can’t see a way around that.”

Holding back tears, Ellison apologized before Kaplan sentenced him, expressing regret for participating in the fraud scheme.

“On some level, my brain doesn’t even comprehend all the people I’ve hurt,” Ellison told the court. “That doesn’t mean I don’t try.”

In March, Kaplan sentenced Bankman-Fried to 25 years in prison after a jury found her guilty of all seven counts of fraud and conspiracy.

Bankman-Fried, 32, remains behind bars at Brooklyn’s notorious Metropolitan Detention Center while he appeals his conviction. Sean “Diddy” Combs is also getting into the infamous jam.

A person familiar with the situation told BI in September that Bankman-Fried and Combs were staying at the same dorm.