Bitcoin Policy Institute steps up as defendant in lawsuit to claim dormant BTC

The Bitcoin Policy Institute (BPI), a nonprofit research group, has officially stepped in to fight a lawsuit that seeks to claim ownership of about 3.7 million Bitcoin.

The case, filed in New York County Supreme Court, argues that Bitcoin left untouched for years should be treated as “abandoned property” under state law. The plaintiffs, led by a person called Noah Doe, are using New York’s lost-and-found law, Article 7-B of the Personal Property Law, to get a judge to declare them the owners of roughly 39,000 wallets that haven’t moved funds in years. 

BPI joins fight for Bitcoin founder’s coins

The Bitcoin Policy Institute (BPI) announced through a post on X that it filed to intervene as a defendant in a case concerning 3.7 million bitcoin.

This includes about 1.10 million BTC from Satoshi-era addresses and nearly 80,000 BTC tied to the 2011 Mt. Gox hack. 

The plaintiffs argue that they “found” dormant wallet addresses, reported them to the NYPD, sent on-chain messages using Bitcoin’s OP_RETURN field to try to contact owners, waited 90 days, and then asked a court to declare the wallets abandoned. 

The Bitcoin Policy Institute, represented by the law firm White & Case, has submitted a proposed answer, 15 affirmative defenses, and plans to file a motion to dismiss. 

The case has since been paused by Judge Kathy J. King until a hearing on July 14. Two amicus briefs have already been filed against the plaintiffs’ claims, one from attorney Ian Cohen and another from the Digital Chamber, a blockchain trade group. 

Galaxy Research valued the targeted coins at nearly $274 billion in late May. However, the plaintiffs may never get to receive that money as analysts have flagged their claim as unenforceable. 

Cryptopolitan reported back in May that Bitcoin has no mechanism to reassign funds without a wallet’s private key. The plaintiffs have admitted that they don’t have these keys. 

Galaxy Research Director Alex Thorn noted that the plaintiffs had already dropped 44 addresses from the case after those wallets moved coins following the lawsuit’s filing. This alone disproves the claim that these wallets are truly abandoned.

Who else is gunning for the coins? 

Before the Bitcoin Policy Institute intervened to kill the case, a pseudonymous defendant calling himself John Doe 33 filed a verified answer and affirmative defenses on July 8, appearing pro se and saying his portfolio topped $80 billion when the case was filed. 

John Doe 33 argues that public Bitcoin addresses are not legal persons and cannot be sued. The plaintiffs simply copied public address data onto a USB drive, and that does not amount to finding or possessing anyone’s coins. He went on to point out that OP_RETURN messages are a poor method of notice because many wallets never display them, and cold-storage users have no reason to check. He also alleges that an identified owner had already contacted plaintiffs’ counsel by phone, disproving the claim that owners were unknown and unreachable.

Two amicus briefs also preceded the institute’s move. Attorney Ian Cohen filed the first on May 29, arguing the dormant coins cannot be treated as lost or abandoned property under New York law, as that only applies to physical objects like jewelry or cash. 

The blockchain trade group Digital Chamber filed the second on July 7 with help from consulting firm CahillNXT and Brown Rudnick attorney Stephen Palley.