Six million British pounds ($7.6 million) of Craig Wright’s assets were placed under a worldwide freezing order by a U.K. judge to stop him from transferring them abroad and avoiding fees related to a legal dispute that determined he was not, as he had claimed, the creator of Bitcoin.
Judge James Mellor, hearing the lawsuit brought by the Crypto Open Patent Alliance (COPA), determined on March 14 that Wright was not the inventor of the original Bitcoin programme or the white paper. Not long after, Wright advised Companies House, the United Kingdom’s company record, that shares in his RCJBR Holding company had been moved to DeMorgan, a business established in accordance with the laws of Singapore.
COPA’s costs total almost 6.7 million pounds, according to a ruling dated Wednesday and published on the Bitcoin Legal Defence Fund website.
Mellor included a reference to the share transfer in the judgement, stating that “understandably, that gave rise to serious concerns on COPA’s part that Dr Wright was implementing measures to seek to evade the costs consequences of his loss at trial.”
Mellor said, “Dr. Wright has a history of default in relation to orders for the payment of money,” and then went on to give specific instances. “…COPA has a strong claim to be granted a significant amount in costs… I believe that dissipation is a very real possibility.”