Judge: Craig Wright’s claim of inventing bitcoin rests on lies and forgeries

Enlarge / Craig Wright arrives at a courthouse in London, England, on February 23, 2024. (credit: Getty Images | Lucy North-PA Images )

A British judge found that Craig Wright “lied repeatedly and extensively” in a case related to Wright’s claim that he is bitcoin inventor Satoshi Nakamoto. “Dr. Wright’s attempts to prove he was/is Satoshi Nakamoto represent a most serious abuse of this Court’s process,” Justice James Mellor of England’s High Court of Justice wrote in a ruling published today.

Wright’s evidence for being Nakamoto “is at best questionable or of very dubious relevance or entirely circumstantial and at worst, it is fabricated and/or based on documents I am satisfied have been forged on a grand scale by Dr. Wright,” Mellor’s ruling said.

Today’s written ruling came two months after Mellor delivered an oral verdict in which he said the evidence shows Wright is not the person who created bitcoin. The written ruling said, “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. Despite acknowledging in this Trial that a few documents were inauthentic (generally blamed on others), he steadfastly refused to acknowledge any of the forged documents. Instead, he lied repeatedly and extensively in his attempts to deflect the allegations of forgery.”