THIS ACTION
For reasons which will become apparent later, it is necessary to rehearse some of the procedural history of this action.
COPA commenced this action on 9th April 2021. In their original Particulars of Claim, COPA pleaded their case that Dr Wright was not Satoshi by reference to publicly available events and documents, including (1) the Sartre Message, (2) the BlackNet Abstract, (3) the ‘12 March 2008 email’ and (4) the SSRN Submission, each of which COPA alleged to be forged. In addition, at that stage, COPA relied on various findings made in the Kleiman litigation (which were not relied on at Trial given the rule in Hollington v Hewthorn, cited below), plus one other matter derived from the Kleiman litigation which was alleged to go to Dr Wright’s credibility: an allegation that an email purportedly from Dave Kleiman to Uyen Nguyen dated 20 December 2012 had been forged by Dr Wright. Obviously, at that stage, COPA did not know what other documents Dr Wright would rely upon as supporting his claim to be Satoshi.
Dr Wright pleaded a full Defence in which he asserted in some detail his positive case that he was Satoshi and provided his explanations of the matters relied upon by COPA. With the benefit of hindsight, his Defence is notable for referring largely to documents which were made public by Satoshi. Bearing in mind the number of documents Dr Wright later disclosed as supporting his claim to be Satoshi, it is notable that the Defence did not make reference to any of them.
Dr Wright did not file any Counterclaim. Following service of COPA’s Reply on 19th July 2021, Dr Wright issued an application seeking to strike out parts of the (by then) Amended Particulars of Claim which was heard by HHJ Paul Matthews in December 2021. He ruled that ‘forgery was in issue’ on the four particular documents pleaded by COPA. His Order gave permission for COPA to add a second matter derived from the Kleiman litigation: that a Deed of Trust document proffered by Dr Wright in the Kleiman case as evidencing the existence of a trust called the Tulip Trust had been backdated. At that point the case involved six allegedly forged documents.
The costs and case management conference was heard by Master Clark on 1st & 2nd September 2022. Her Order (sealed on 4th October 2022) set out directions down to the trial, which was subsequently listed to commence in January 2024. Of relevance are the following features of her Order:
The Master considered and approved the Disclosure Review Document, the purpose of which was to define the scope of disclosure to be given and the searches which were to be carried out to locate relevant documents.
The parties were ordered to give extended disclosure by 31st January 2023. In the event, extended disclosure took place on 7th March 2023. Both Dr Wright and COPA have given further disclosure at various points subsequently, a point to which I return later. It is also relevant to note that a full discovery exercise had already taken place for the Kleiman proceedings, and it involved Alix & Partners undertaking a comprehensive search at Dr Wright’s home for any computers, hard drives etc which were to be (and were) imaged and searched for relevant documents.
On 28th February 2023, Dr Wright was to file ‘a list of documents upon which he primarily relies in relation to the factual issue of whether or not he is the author of the Bitcoin White Paper. Such list will not preclude the Defendant from relying upon other documents in support of his case and may be updated from time to time to include further documents or to exclude documents.’ This list became known as Dr Wright’s ‘Primary Reliance Documents’. Due to the slippage in the timetable, the list was produced on 4 April 2023, originally containing 100 documents, but updated subsequently in the light of some further disclosure Dr Wright gave to 107.
On or before 28th March 2023, COPA was given the power to request ‘Chain of Custody’ information for any of Dr Wright’s Primary Reliance Documents, with the requested information to be supplied 4 weeks later. Following service of Dr Wright’s list of his Primary Reliance Documents, COPA requested Chain of Custody information for all of them.
On or before 31st March 2023, COPA was to serve a list of any disclosed documents the authenticity of which was denied or not admitted (the ‘Challenged Documents’). In the event, the list of Challenged Documents was served on 5 May 2023, (again later revised in the light of the further disclosure given by Dr Wright) which made clear that COPA was challenging authenticity in respect of (almost) all of Dr Wright’s Reliance Documents, as well as a large number of other documents in Dr Wright’s disclosure.
The following procedural steps were for exchange of witness statements on 2nd June 2023, which in fact took place on 28 July 2023, followed by sequential exchange of expert evidence on forensic document analysis, with COPA’s expert originally set to serve his report on 30th June 2023, Dr Wright’s expert evidence on 25th August 2023 and a reply from COPA’s expert on 22nd September 2023. There was also provision for expert evidence relating to relevant aspects of digital currency technology.
A point of some significance was a further direction, made by the Master at the explicit request of Dr Wright’s then Counsel, for evidence of fact in reply after all the expert evidence had been filed. In other words, Dr Wright requested and obtained the ability to serve his evidence in reply in response to the expert evidence.
Although all the specific dates originally directed were extended, the basic sequence of the service of evidence was retained.