An early Bitcoin miner said he lost more than $700 million in wealth more than a decade ago when his partner accidentally threw a hard drive containing 8,000 coins into a landfill.
James Howells, of Newport, Wales, has asked his local council if he could dig up a dumpster to find discarded hard drives, but has so far been refused.
Mr Howells is now taking Newport City Council to court, claiming he must either be granted access to his property or settle damages commensurate with the value of the drive.
Howells, 39, said he first mined his own coins in 2009, but was drawn to the world of cryptocurrencies during the financial crisis the year before.
The bitcoins were stored in a private key on the hard drive of Mr. Howells' computer, which sat in a drawer while Mr. Howells, a systems engineer by trade, updated his PC.
Howells said in 2013 that she was putting the hard drive in a plastic bag when her ex-partner accidentally went straight to the dumpster and threw it in a large trash can.
At the time of writing, the price of Bitcoin has reached an all-time high of $93,637, so the buried drive could be worth more than $749 million.
“This problem is never going to go away. It's always going to be a treasure hunt,” Howells says. luck In a telephone interview. “The value of treasure is increasing day by day, and it will never stop.”
Desperate to recover the hard drive, Howells said he has offered Newport City Council to spend 25 per cent of its value on community projects in return for its help.
But he claimed the council had turned down Mr Howells' requests to dig up the dump about 10 times.
I won't give up on litigation.
As a result, the beleaguered cryptocurrency fan has reduced his offer to 10% of the drive's value and says he is prepared to sue for 500 million pounds sterling if search access is not granted.
Mr Howells added that his legal team will take the case to the Commercial Court in Cardiff, the Welsh capital, on December 3.
They will argue that Mr. Howells not only has intellectual property rights to the drive because he mined the coins, but also general property rights because he did not willingly turn over the objects to a city-owned landfill.
A Newport City Council spokesperson said: luck: “Newport City Council has been approached numerous times since 2013 about the possibility of recovering IT hardware that is said to be in landfill.
“The City Council has told Mr Howells on numerous occasions that excavation is not possible under the environmental permits and that work of that nature would have a significant negative environmental impact on the surrounding area.
“The council is the only body authorized to carry out the work on the ground.”
Regarding the legal proceedings, the spokesperson added: Howells' claims are baseless and are being vigorously resisted by the city council. ”
Howells claims he knows exactly when an iPhone-sized hard drive was thrown away, so all he has to do is dig a small piece of land.
Howells added that he doesn't even want the drive back because he could become a multi-millionaire, seeking justice after more than a decade of fighting and potentially losing wealth to businesses close to his own. He said he just wants the ability to invest.
He added: “The main reason we go to court is to seek access to the landfill. But…if that option is not available, then yes, I will pursue a full claim against the council. But I really don't want to do that.
“I prefer to dig and investigate because it makes economic sense…if we can recover. [the coins] In reality, it could be worth up to 20% more than Bitcoin's current book value. The reason is that these are 2009 coins, so they are considered collector items. ”
He added that the coin has never been traded and will continue to increase in value.
“The first … mistake was obviously that I accidentally put the hard drive in the black bag,” Howells said.
“Then my partner took the hard drive to the landfill and I think the biggest mistake was Newport City Council not responding to me when I first asked the question in 2013.
“It would have been much easier to restore that hard drive back in 2013 if I only had three or four months worth of data left. And secondly, if the Newport City Council had engaged with me. They would have learned everything they could about Bitcoin, cryptocurrencies, and blockchain technology – and they would have been… rich right now.”
