A man stole 4 BTC and was sentenced to 12 years and 7 months in prison. A Fuzhou court ruled that stealing Bitcoin constitutes the crime of theft.

Odaily Planet Daily News The Cangshan District People's Procuratorate of Fuzhou disclosed that a man was sentenced to 12 years and 7 months in prison and fined 300,000 yuan for stealing 4 Bitcoins from another person and illegally profiting approximately 900,000 yuan. The court convicted him of theft, and the second-instance trial upheld the original verdict.

According to the case details, at the end of 2020, Wang entrusted Lin to help liquidate his Bitcoin holdings. During the process of handling Wang's Bitcoin wallet hard drive and computer, Lin stole the wallet's "private key" and related data, transferred the 4 Bitcoins to his own account, and subsequently sold them off for profit. In 2024, Wang discovered the asset anomaly and reported it to the police, leading to Lin's arrest.

The procuratorate stated that although current Chinese regulations clearly stipulate that virtual currencies do not have the status of legal tender, Bitcoin possesses characteristics of value, manageability, and transferability. It conforms to the general characteristics of "property" under criminal law, thus falling under the category of property crime. Related infringements will also be subject to criminal liability.