Court Orders self-proclaimed Bitcoin Creator to produce a list of his public Bitcoin addresses

Craig Wright, the ill-famed Australian computer programmer and self-professed inventor of Bitcoin (BTC), seems to find himself in court more often than most prominent figures in the crypto community. In the latest stage of an on-going legal battle over his alleged theft of cryptocurrency assets from the company he co-owned with the late computer forensic expert David Kleiman, the US District Court of the Southern District of Florida has ordered him to present a list of his public Bitcoin addresses by May 8.  The court order reads:

“The Court has already found that tracing Dr Wright’s bitcoin holdings is relevant to the Plaintiffs’ theft claims. The order to produce a list of bitcoin holdings as of December 31, 2013, was a compromise; it was the Court’s attempt to provide Plaintiffs with relevant and material evidence without unduly burdening Dr Wright. That Dr. Wright now argues it is not feasible for him to identify the bitcoin he held on December 31, 2013, does not diminish Plaintiffs’ entitlement to the pertinent evidence.”

“On or before May 8, 2019, at 5:00 p.m. Eastern time, Dr. Wright shall provide to Plaintiffs a sworn declaration identifying the name and location of the blind trust, the name and contact information for the current trustee and any past trustees, and the names and contact information of any current or past beneficiaries.”

Filed on February 2018, the lawsuit alleges that the controversial scientist and Dave Kleiman partnered up to form a bitcoin-mining venture in 2011. The company allegedly mined over 1 million BTC.  Upon Kleiman’s death in 2013, Wright allegedly forged and backdated several documents and transferred the deceased crypto assets to his addresses. At the time of the lawsuit, the coins were worth around $5 billion.

Earlier in 2016, Mr Wright made headlines with the claim that he was Satoshi Nakamoto, the mysterious inventor of Bitcoin. He has, however, failed to prove his claims. Currently, Wright acts as the chief scientist at nChain, the company behind the embattled Bitcoin SV.