Craig Wright, the computer scientist ruled to have lied “extensively and repeatedly” about being the inventor of Bitcoin, has been given a one-year prison sentence by a UK judge after being found in contempt of court. The sentence is suspended for two years, meaning that Wright will only face prison if he reoffends during that period.
At a hearing Thursday in the UK High Court, Justice James Edward Mellor ruled that Wright—in bringing a $1.15 trillion lawsuit in October against Bitcoin developers and payments firm Square—had violated an earlier court order. The order required that Wright refrain from claiming publicly to be Satoshi Nakamoto, the creator of Bitcoin, and taking legal action on that basis, among other things.
Representatives to Craig Wright did not respond immediately to a request for comment. At the hearing, he is reported to have said he will appeal the contempt finding.
The contempt of court issue was raised by the Crypto Open Patent Alliance (COPA), a nonprofit consortium of crypto firms, which in February took Wright to trial in the hope of securing a formal declaration that he is not Satoshi. The aim was to prevent Wright from carrying forward multiple separate lawsuits against Bitcoin developers and other parties, through which he was trying to assert intellectual property rights over Bitcoin—and to ward off any future lawfare.
On March 14, the final day of the six-week trial, Mellor delivered a rare snap verdict: “The evidence is overwhelming,” he told the courtroom. “Dr Wright is not the person who adopted or operated under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto.”
“It is clear that Dr Wright engaged in the deliberate production of false documents to support false claims and use the Courts as a vehicle for fraud,” wrote Mellor in his judgment. “I am entirely satisfied that Dr Wright lied to the Court extensively and repeatedly. All his lies and forged documents were in support of his biggest lie: his claim to be Satoshi Nakamoto.”
At a hearing in July, in addition to imposing the various injunctions upon Wright, Mellor directed the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), the body responsible for prosecuting criminal cases in the UK, to consider bringing criminal charges against Wright for his “wholesale perjury.” (The CPS has not yet charged Wright with perjury.)