Produced | Odaily (ID: o-daily)

Produced | Odaily (ID: o-daily)

The case, known as Kleiman v. Wright Appropriation of Estate, has been going on for 1 year and 6 months. According to the judgment on the 26th, Craig Wright (known as CSW or "Aoben Cong") must hand over 50% of the BTC and related intellectual property rights he held before December 31, 2013 to Ira Kleiman.

The case still has some procedures to finalize, including a jury trial and a final trial to be held in March next year. But the conclusion is basically set. CSW said it would abide by the court's decision and hand over approximately 500,000 bitcoins (currently valued at $5 billion) to Ira.

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CSW is one-third "Satoshi Nakamoto"?

The name Ira Kleiman is unknown in the circle. Sudden fortune, but also rely on his brother - Dave Kleiman. The court that tried the case this time is in the hometown of the two brothers.

Dave Kleiman and CSW became famous in the currency circle at the same time.

In May 2016, CSW publicly stated that he and Dave were the creators of Bitcoin. And cited two emails as evidence.

In March 2008, CSW sent an email to Dave Kleiman, which read:

"I'm going to be releasing a paper later this year and I need your help editing it. I've been working on a new type of electronic currency, Bit cash, or Bitcoin. , you are always there for me, Dave, and I want you to be a part of this paper."

This is the earliest place where the term "Bitcoin" can be found.

In late 2008, CSW sent another email to Dave Kleiman, which read:

"I need your help, you edited my thesis, now I need your help to frame this idea."

However, Dave Kleiman passed away in April 2013. CSW's statement has no witnesses, nor has he been able to produce the address private key that dug out the genesis block or earlier blocks. Not only could it not prove itself, CSW was also accused of fabricating evidence-a "Satoshi Nakamoto" signature it had presented proved to be fake.

These are old things.

According to a report by Modern Consensus on August 26, the judge in the case ruled that "Satoshi Nakamoto" was a group of three, and CSW and Dave Kleiman were two of them. The report did not mention who the third person was.

The two established a company called W&K Info Defense Research LLC in 2011 to mine and apply for bitcoin-related patents. The patent should not be the original Bitcoin code (version 0.1), as it was not mentioned in the judgment. In addition, CSW only applied for a patent on this open source code in the United States in May of this year.

So, how did the court find that CSW and Dave Kleiman were members of "Satoshi Nakamoto"?

In fact, the judge did not prove and avoided the issue. The judge said at the beginning of the judgment, the Court does not decide, whether Defendant (defendant) Dr. Craig Wright is Satoshi Nakamoto. We have no way of knowing the basis for this report by Modern Consensu.

That is to say, the court only made one judgment, which is that the patents generated during the partnership between the two should be owned by the partnership company, and because the two hold 50% of the shares, the patent should be half of Dave Kleiman's. Whether the patent really belongs to CSW and Dave Kleiman is a matter for the Copyright Office.

Previously, CSW applied for the patent of the Bitcoin white paper and the original code and had already educated the market. Having a patent cannot prove that you are really the original author, but as long as there is no owner, that is, Satoshi Nakamoto, to stand up and falsify, then the patent is valid. can be yours.

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historical encounter

As mentioned earlier, the real transfer of assets will have to wait at least until after the final trial in March next year. If the transfer is successful at that time, there is no doubt that CSW is currently worth billions of dollars or even tens of billions of dollars as reported by the media. .

In addition to the label of "liar", a more reliable identity for CSW may be a mining boss.

After Bitcoin went online in 2009, there has been an influx of mining troops. The earliest miners were geeks like CSW and Dave Kleiman.

At the time, Dave Kleiman was already somewhat accomplished in the field of cryptography, a regular contributor to the "Cryptography and Security" mailing list, and a long-time member of the Metzdowd Cryptography mailing list, which is where the Bitcoin white paper was published.

At that time, CSW did not seem to have any representative works, but still co-authored papers and books with Dave Kleiman, and the topic was not limited to point-to-point encryption technology.

After the birth of Bitcoin, the two began to mine and hoard Bitcoin. By 2011, the two co-founded a company to do it.

According to the court judgment, “CSW and Dave Kleiman entered into a 50-50 partnership . The property developed belongs to the partnership enterprise, and the two parties shall share it equally.”

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australian verdict

CSW has always been a patent lover. He said in an interview recently that I have obtained 800 intellectual property rights, and I will apply for more patents in the future.

Among these 800 patents, there are some from W&K Company.

Following Dave's death, CSW filed two lawsuits against W&K in the Supreme Court of New South Wales, Australia, in July and August 2013, alleging the company failed to pay property and consultants necessary to "completion of the study," court documents show. services and seeks $54 million in damages.

CSW also filed a "Liquidated Indemnity Undertaking," which states that "in the event of failure to indemnify, all intellectual property rights shall remain with the sole owner, CSW."

As a result of this lawsuit, CSW got its wish.

The trial materials of the District Court for the Southern District of Florida show that when W&K was established, Dave was the administrator and registered agent, and CSW acted on behalf of W&K in many aspects, including as authorized agent, leading researcher, legal representative, etc. . Additionally, Ira testified that CSW had told himself that he was Dave's partner and that no one else knew about their partnership and W&K.

In addition, CSW identified itself in the Australian trial as W&K's "legal representative or agent" and its Australian address and mail as W&K's "address for service". It can be explained that CSW became the sole partner of W&K after Dave's death. Now he has to obtain the company's "unpaid money" through legal channels, which shows that the drunkard's intention is not to drink.

Looking through the court records of the Australian trial, on August 28, 2013, CSW submitted the so-called W&K Company Proposed Consent Order - signed by "Authorized Administrator J Wilson" and became the basis of the final judgment. But in fact, J Wilson is an employee of CSW, not an authorized manager of W&K.

Based on the above, the District Court for the Southern District of Florida held that the Australian judgment in 2013 was not based on the fact of chance itself, and therefore basically overturned the previous judgment that CSW obtained the patent from W&K.

According to the materials released by the court, CSW has stated that the intellectual property rights it obtained in W&K were provided to CSW’s family trust fund, and then dispersed and transferred to some other organizational entities, such as Hotwire, Coin Exchange, and Cloudcroft.

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The assets involved in the case amounted to 1.1 million bitcoins?

In addition to patents, the bitcoins mined by the two together in the name of W&K also fell into the pockets of CSW.

Everyone may want to know how many bitcoins were mined during the partnership between the two, or how many bitcoins will CSW return to Ira Kleiman?

Ira Kleiman stated in the indictment, "The defendant transferred at least 300,000 bitcoins after Dave's death and transferred them to several different trusts in the world." The actual income may exceed Ira Kleiman's expectations.

CSW said in an interview recently, "I spent more money than Dave Kleiman on the W&K project... Dave Kleiman should have 320,000 bitcoins, and I should have 800,000 bitcoins, but now it is one and a half."

It seems unfair to CSW, but if Ira Kleiman did not file a lawsuit, then Dave Kleiman's "320,000 bitcoins" were actually directly embezzled by CSW.

According to CSW's statement, the 1.1 million bitcoins were placed in several trusts called Tulips.

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CSW's defense

Ira Kleiman filed 9 lawsuits with only one purpose, which is to get back the bitcoins dug by Dave and the related patents in which he participated.

CSW did not give in, and asked the court to dismiss the prosecution on eight grounds.

For example, CSW argues that since the two parties take W&K as the main body to generate mining revenue and intellectual property rights, only W&K is eligible to file a lawsuit.

Clearly, W&K is now owned by CSW and its attorneys, so how should its former partner Dave (representative) claim his interest?

CSW went on to argue that the plaintiff's suit should be dismissed on the basis of the principle of res judicata (that is, the court should respect the previous Australian court judgment and award the W&K patent rights to CSW).

CSW also argued that the case was not within the jurisdiction of the Southern District of Florida because many of his witnesses were in Australia or abroad. As a last resort, plaintiffs testified to witnesses who could help prove the claim, nine in Florida and five elsewhere in the United States. And most evidence located abroad is linked to CSW, which is easily accessible.

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Will $5 Billion Bitcoin Be Sold?

Although CSW has basically lost the lawsuit, it is difficult to change his personality of talking.

He has repeatedly emphasized during the trial and in the face of the media that if Ira Kleiman inherits $5 billion in bitcoin, he must first pay the estate tax. The inheritance tax rate is about 40%, unless Iran has $2 billion in cash, otherwise It will sell $2 billion of Bitcoin to the market, which will have a huge impact on the market.

CSW's intimidation is not without reason. "I can't convince Ira Kleiman not to sell bitcoin, he's doing what he has to do, he's not me. I don't need bitcoin (because I'm rich enough already), I obey court orders, but the verdict may be became very scary."

"I used to own $10 billion worth of bitcoin and I never touched it. Well now someone is going to dump bitcoin - when you find a gorilla don't kick it in the pile in nuts."

People can't help but ask, after Ira Kleiman inherited a large amount of wealth from his brother, will he disregard his brother's hard work and make a move to shake the market? In any case, Ira will be a big variable in the future market.

But in turn, if these 1.1 million bitcoins are brought together in the hands of CSW, the market will also tremble, because he is promoting bitcoin's altcoin-BSV. For this reason, he did not hesitate to leave the Bitcoin community, so would he care about the future life and death of the community?

However, if it is indeed sitting on $10 billion in assets, will CSW be afraid of a state court judgment? Especially in the case of his subjective reluctance, he has countless ways to evade sanctions. Or, the inheritance that Ira is fighting for, CSW's "tens of billions" of wealth, may just be a mirage in CSW's mouth, and he may have sold it at some point.