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I don’t understand why courts even entertain this guy Shouldn’t he have been locked up for contempt and perjury like 100 times for this stunt? Shouldn’t his p

I don’t understand why courts even entertain this guy Shouldn’t he have been locked up for contempt and perjury like 100 times for this stunt? Shouldn’t his pathological lying gotten cases dismissed, or himself committed into an institution involuntarily?

seanhunter 3y ago
He was the respondant in this lawsuit. The plaintiff (copa) was seeking injunctive relief to get him to stop saying he was Satoshi because he basically goes around the world doing it.
- nullc 3y ago
  That isn't quite accurate. This was a joint trial for a preliminary issue in two cases. In one case Wright brought a claim seeking "hundreds of billions of pounds" in damages against volunteer open source contributors to Bitcoin on the basis that their use and distribution of Bitcoin violate his database rights in the Bitcoin blockchain, Copyright in the Bitcoin whitepaper, and copyright in the bitcoin file format. In the other case The Crypto Open Patent alliance (COPA) sought a declaratory judgement on behalf of its members who had been threatened with litigation by Wright for distributing the Bitcoin whitepaper. COPA's request for declaratory judgement was subsequent to Wright bringing a similar claim against the operator of Bitcoin.org (the original Bitcoin website) and securing a default judgement against them because by policy the UK will not allow an anonymous party to present a defense, resulting in an order against Bitcoin.org to prohibit it from distributing the bitcoin whitepaper in the UK. Wright had also previously brought defamation claims against a number of private individuals for simply saying Wright isn't Satoshi, so the legal threats that motivated and justified COPA's declaratory relief weren't fanciful, but both serious and chilling.
nullc 3y ago
> I don’t understand why courts even entertain this guy There are a number of protections against spurious litigation, -- though it seems like there are more in the US than the UK. Unfortunately, some are defeated by simply being willing to lie arbitrarily others are defeated by the claimant not being poor. E.g. summary judgements are sought on the basis that the non-movants facts are true. So you can escape your case being discarded on a summary basis by being sure to allege whatever lies are required to keep your case alive. Courts often dispel kook cases often on the basis that they haven't complied with technical formalities. If you're able to pay for high powered representation these hurdles can be cleared. > Shouldn’t he have been locked up for contempt and perjury like 100 times for this stunt? Perjury is very rarely punished directly. Generally the punishment for perjury is that you lose your case. > committed into an institution involuntarily I've seen no evidence that Wright is unable to tell the truth. He tells lies that boost his ego and benefit him financially. His conduct is criminal. Perhaps, as is often the case for criminals, there is some underlying personality disorder or psychological malfunction that pushes them in this direction, but who knows. Wright's fraud appears to have begun in a fairly boring way: Since at least 2003 he had engaged in fairly pedestrian tax fraud-- claiming fraudulent R&D tax credits and GST (sales tax) refunds. It appears that over time he became more and more bold with his claims until they finally caught the attention of authorities. Everything since has just been one lie after another to cover up the current. I find it pretty offensive, -- right now GST fraud is a big deal in AU with now billions estimated being stolen per year. The ATO is putting up videos on their site of raiding the homes of people obviously living in public housing who stole a few thousand dollars. Wright stole millions and attempted to steal tens of millions and has since been living the high life in London, issuing violent threats and vexatious litigation and basically being a huge ass. But perhaps I'm biased, given that I'm one of his litigation targets. In any case, it's often the case for conmen that their scheme only ends when its finally grown too big for them to grow any larger. When that happens people ask why wasn't it stopped before and the answer is just that at the prior scale the con was able to evade the consequences... but eventually their luck or their pool of ready victims ran out. To make an example in this case-- you'd think this could have been dispelled with quickly by the court simply ordering him to produce signatures with Satoshi's keys since he's claimed to have done that before (but the one public example was a fake, just a signature copied off the blockchain). But Wright claimed that for inconsistently described reasons he destroyed the keys... buying himself a few more years.

seanhunter 3y ago

He was the respondant in this lawsuit. The plaintiff (copa) was seeking injunctive relief to get him to stop saying he was Satoshi because he basically goes around the world doing it.

nullc 3y ago
That isn't quite accurate. This was a joint trial for a preliminary issue in two cases. In one case Wright brought a claim seeking "hundreds of billions of pounds" in damages against volunteer open source contributors to Bitcoin on the basis that their use and distribution of Bitcoin violate his database rights in the Bitcoin blockchain, Copyright in the Bitcoin whitepaper, and copyright in the bitcoin file format. In the other case The Crypto Open Patent alliance (COPA) sought a declaratory judgement on behalf of its members who had been threatened with litigation by Wright for distributing the Bitcoin whitepaper. COPA's request for declaratory judgement was subsequent to Wright bringing a similar claim against the operator of Bitcoin.org (the original Bitcoin website) and securing a default judgement against them because by policy the UK will not allow an anonymous party to present a defense, resulting in an order against Bitcoin.org to prohibit it from distributing the bitcoin whitepaper in the UK. Wright had also previously brought defamation claims against a number of private individuals for simply saying Wright isn't Satoshi, so the legal threats that motivated and justified COPA's declaratory relief weren't fanciful, but both serious and chilling.

nullc 3y ago

> I don’t understand why courts even entertain this guy There are a number of protections against spurious litigation, -- though it seems like there are more in the US than the UK. Unfortunately, some are defeated by simply being willing to lie arbitrarily others are defeated by the claimant not being poor. E.g. summary judgements are sought on the basis that the non-movants facts are true. So you can escape your case being discarded on a summary basis by being sure to allege whatever lies are required to keep your case alive. Courts often dispel kook cases often on the basis that they haven't complied with technical formalities. If you're able to pay for high powered representation these hurdles can be cleared. > Shouldn’t he have been locked up for contempt and perjury like 100 times for this stunt? Perjury is very rarely punished directly. Generally the punishment for perjury is that you lose your case. > committed into an institution involuntarily I've seen no evidence that Wright is unable to tell the truth. He tells lies that boost his ego and benefit him financially. His conduct is criminal. Perhaps, as is often the case for criminals, there is some underlying personality disorder or psychological malfunction that pushes them in this direction, but who knows. Wright's fraud appears to have begun in a fairly boring way: Since at least 2003 he had engaged in fairly pedestrian tax fraud-- claiming fraudulent R&D tax credits and GST (sales tax) refunds. It appears that over time he became more and more bold with his claims until they finally caught the attention of authorities. Everything since has just been one lie after another to cover up the current. I find it pretty offensive, -- right now GST fraud is a big deal in AU with now billions estimated being stolen per year. The ATO is putting up videos on their site of raiding the homes of people obviously living in public housing who stole a few thousand dollars. Wright stole millions and attempted to steal tens of millions and has since been living the high life in London, issuing violent threats and vexatious litigation and basically being a huge ass. But perhaps I'm biased, given that I'm one of his litigation targets. In any case, it's often the case for conmen that their scheme only ends when its finally grown too big for them to grow any larger. When that happens people ask why wasn't it stopped before and the answer is just that at the prior scale the con was able to evade the consequences... but eventually their luck or their pool of ready victims ran out. To make an example in this case-- you'd think this could have been dispelled with quickly by the court simply ordering him to produce signatures with Satoshi's keys since he's claimed to have done that before (but the one public example was a fake, just a signature copied off the blockchain). But Wright claimed that for inconsistently described reasons he destroyed the keys... buying himself a few more years.