On Monday, a civil case started in Miami, the participants of which are trying to divide 1.1 million bitcoins without having access to them.
Australian entrepreneur and computer systems specialist Craig Wright has credited himself with inventing bitcoin since 2016. According to the lawsuit, he is not the only one involved in the creation of the cryptocurrency. Plaintiff Ira Kleiman - the brother of Wright's deceased comrade David Kleiman - claims BTC, estimated at $66 billion at the current exchange rate.
David Kleiman and Wright co-founded the firm W&K Info Defense Research, LLC, which they used to mine bitcoin and register intellectual property, including the source code of the cryptocurrency, the lawsuit says. Ira insists that bitcoin mining was his brother's task, and Wright appropriated them through fraud and falsification. Wright, in turn, denies the accusations and states that he and David were friends, but not partners, and the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto belongs to him alone.
A panel of 10 jurors was selected on Monday. Within three weeks, they must hear the explanations of the parties and make a decision, writes CoinDesk.
In his opening remarks, the representative of the Kleymans, Kyle Roche, tried to show contradictions in Wright's statements. He showed emails in which Wright repeatedly refers to David Kleiman as his "partner" and "business partner" until the very moment of his death in April 2013. According to Roche, after filing the lawsuit in 2018, Wright began to deny having a partnership with Kleiman and with anyone at all, besides his wife Ramona Watts.
"He was never my partner. I hate the idea of partnership," Wright said on April 4, 2019.
Wright's defense is based on two aspects: his diagnosed autism spectrum disorder and the absence of a written agreement with Kleiman. Wright's representative, Amanda McGovern, said that because of her client's autism, he and Kleiman had a different perception of the word "partner".
"He had a difficult childhood and few friends. Even his own sister thought he was strange. When he was 13, he came to the playground in a ninja costume, and all the guys called him a freak," McGovern said.
Roche, however, noted that the disorder was diagnosed in Wright only after 2018 by a doctor acting as a witness for the defense. At the same time, the doctor made the diagnosis over the phone and at that time had never seen Wright in person.
At the same time, neither side questions Wright's invention of bitcoin, although in the past Wright has in every way avoided offers to prove it. In May 2016, he promised to move Satoshi Nakamoto's coins, but later stated:
"I'm not brave enough. I can't."
In addition, many experts called the cryptographic proof of ownership of wallets provided by Wright a fake. Researcher Kim Nilsson claims that many of the addresses indicated by Wright are in fact connected with the hacking of the Mt exchange. Gox in 2014. Thus, even if the jury decides that Ira Kleiman can claim Nakamoto's bitcoins, the court probably will not have the means to enforce this decision.