Craig Wright Sentenced To 1 Year In Prison: The Self-Proclaimed Bitcoin Creator Faces Justice

Craig Wright, the computer scientist who claims to be Satoshi Nakamoto, was the elusive inventor of Bitcoin. convicted On Thursday, a British judge sentenced him to a year in prison for contempt of court.

The decision, issued by Justice James Edward Mellor, follows a comprehensive analysis of Wright’s conduct, which the court ruled included “substantial and persistent lies” about his status as Bitcoin’s founder.

However, the sentence was suspended for two years, meaning Wright will only serve time if he commits further crimes during this probationary period.

Craig Wright’s legal troubles deepen

This ruling stems from a high-profile case where Craig Wright filed a staggering $1.15 trillion lawsuit against Bitcoin developers and payments company Square. The court found that he violated a prior order prohibiting him from publicly claiming to be Satoshi Nakamoto and taking legal action based on that assertion.

At the final hearing, Wright reportedly expressed his intention to appeal the contempt ruling, although he could not be reached for immediate comment. However, Wright’s legal troubles escalated when the Crypto Open Patent Alliance (COPA), a consortium of cryptocurrency companies, began proceedings against him.

COPA sought a formal declaration that Craig Wright is not Satoshi Nakamoto, with the aim of limiting his ability to pursue multiple lawsuits against Bitcoin developers and others regarding intellectual property rights associated with Bitcoin.

During the six-week trial, Judge Mellor delivered a rare swift ruling, saying: “The evidence is overwhelming.” He concluded that Wright was not the person working under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto and accused him of deliberately fabricating documents to support his claims.

The judge described Craig Wright’s actions as a “vehicle of fraud,” stressing that his extensive lies were intended to reinforce his core lie: his identity as the creator of Bitcoin.

In addition to the contempt ruling, Judge Mellor directed the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to consider bringing criminal charges against Wright for what he described as “wholesale perjury”. However, to date, no perjury charges have been filed against him.

Wright’s claims about changing Bitcoin have been denied

Craig Wright’s October lawsuit against developers Square and Bitcoin accused them of “misrepresenting” bitcoin (BTC) as the original cryptocurrency.

He claimed that they had changed the original Bitcoin protocol without permission, asserting that these changes fundamentally deviated from the system outlined by Satoshi Nakamoto in the Bitcoin white paper.

Cuba Law, on the other hand, argued that Craig Wright’s lawsuit violated the statutory orders imposed on him, alleging contempt on five different grounds.

In his ruling, Judge Mellor Wright ordered a halt to his legal action against Square and the Bitcoin developers, saying: “There is no doubt that each of these contempts has been proven.”

Craig Wright was scheduled to attend a hearing to address the contempt claims but failed to attend, citing potential financial losses in excess of £240,000 ($303,000) as the reason for his absence. Reports indicate that he is currently in Asia, possibly in Singapore or Indonesia, but he did not reveal his exact location when asked by the court.

At the time of writing, Bitcoin is trading at $96,340, having missed the key $100,000 mark following the US Federal Reserve’s (Fed) decision to cut interest rates on Wednesday. Currently, Bitcoin has fallen by approximately 5% in the past 24 hours.

Featured image from the Financial Times, chart from TradingView.com