Man loses lawsuit to recover lost bitcoins from UK landfill

In the year James Howells, a Welsh IT engineer from Newport who lost his Bitcoin hard drive in a landfill in 2013, today lost his legal battle to recover the cryptocurrency he used to access his website.

In the year The hard drive that buried 8,000 bitcoins in 2009 is now worth over $770 million. The judge dismissed the case citing “no real hope” to succeed in a full trial.

A series of unsuccessful events

In the year In 2013, Howells' partner disposed of a laptop hard drive containing 8,000 bitcoins in a landfill in Newport, Wales.

Recognizing the potential value of the lost bitcoins, Howells suggests a dump site excavation to try to find the hard drive. In doing so, Howells offered to fund the mining process and share 25% of the Bitcoin found with the city council.

However, Newport City Council rejected the request, citing the high cost of drilling and the impact it would have on the environment. Howells continued to try for more than a decade as the council repeatedly rejected his requests.

Today, Judge Kaiser, the Circuit Commercial Judge for Wells, dismissed a lawsuit by James Howells, who sought permission to dig up a Newport landfill in search of a hard drive.

In his decision, Judge Kaiser Howells said there were no “reasonable grounds” to bring the claim and there was no “realistic prospect” of success if the case proceeded to a full trial.

Note: History of Bitcoin Pizza Day

Howell's misfortune is reminiscent of the story of Bitcoin Pizza Day. In the year In May 2012, a programmer named Laszlo Haniech bought two pizzas from a local pizza vendor, Papa John's. Instead of using cash or credit cards, Hanyecz decided to pay using Bitcoin.

Hanyecz ended up paying 10,000 BTC for both pizzas, which was $41 at the time. He also had no idea that his pizza order was the first recorded real-world BTC transaction in history.

“I pay 10,000 bitcoins for two pizzas.. like maybe 2 large ones, so I have some left over for the next day,” Laszlo Hanyecz posted on the Bitcoin Talk forum.

The first transaction using Bitcoin would be worth over $708 million today. When Bitcoin passed the $100,000 mark in early December, the two pizzas could have been worth more than a billion dollars.

On the one hand, the stories of Howells and Haniches are remembered as shocking mishaps in the history of digital assets. On the other hand, they represent how much Bitcoin has grown since its inception in 2009.