Legal Notice And Next Steps

SCA Ontier LLP Halton House 20-23 Holborn London EC1N 2JD By email to: [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected] [email protected]

D: +44 20 3060 6451 E: [email protected]

Fax no: Our ref: ST07/KAM/MCC94.1 Pages: Your ref: DS/SS/WRI2.1

8 August 2019

Dear Sirs Craig Wright v Peter McCormack – claim no: QB-2019-001430

Please find enclosed by way of service our client’s Defence. We also enclose a Request for Further Information of the Particulars of Claim. Your client’s claim It will be apparent from these documents that we consider your client’s claim to be at heart a cynical and abusive use of the court process. It is also in any event wholly lacking in the fundamental particulars of serious harm now required by Lachaux v Independent Print Ltd [2019] 3 WLR 18. In addition it fails to identify the European Union states in respect of which damage is claimed and the basis for such a claim.

In short, the contention that your client has suffered or is likely to suffer serious harm to his reputation in this jurisdiction (or, if relevant, in other EU states) is fanciful. The allegation complained of – that he has fraudulently claimed to be Satoshi Nakamoto – is entirely borne of his own conduct, in making public promises and then failing, since May 2016, to prove that he is Satoshi. This is not therefore a case of relying on other publications contrary to the Dingle line of authority. It is your client’s own conduct, his failed promises, and the spurious explanations for

them, which has become over the years notorious to the extent that, within the bitcoin and cryptocurrency sector in particular, the allegation of lying is synonymous with your client and he has no reputation in that respect which can be damaged. We consider therefore that it is inconceivable that he could establish that our client’s ten Tweets caused any harm, let alone, any serious harm to his reputation in this jurisdiction.

Following the decision of the Supreme Court in Lachaux (which we note post-dates the Particulars of Claim), your client must establish serious harm as actual provable fact; not merely as an inference from the words complained of (which is how it has been pleaded in the Particulars of Claim but which we consider unsustainable in this case anyway, as explained in the Defence).

Next steps However, without prejudice to our client’s case on serious harm and before inviting the court to determine it, we invite your client to provide the following information within 21 days of the date of this letter. We invite your client to provide to our client on a voluntary basis the “proof” that he is Satoshi Nakamoto, which he and Calvin Ayre, on his behalf, have indicated that they possess and will produce in these proceedings. We refer you to paragraph 20 of the Defence. Our client is prepared to walk away from these proceedings without any contribution to his costs incurred so far if your client provides satisfactory and independently verifiable proof that he is Satoshi. Our client would also in that event be prepared to make a public statement withdrawing the allegation that your client’s claim to be Satoshi is fraudulent. This is, after all, what your client has been publicly promising and conspicuously failing to do since May 2016. It is correspondingly what our client, along with a great many other commentators, have been inviting him to do. Please note that this offer is subject to contract.

This is therefore an eminently reasonable and sensible proposal intended to avoid what, on your client’s own case, would be the wholly unnecessary costs and delay of litigation. It would obviously be highly unattractive for a claimant to seek to pursue a libel claim merely in order to “bankrupt” the defendant, as Mr Ayre’s tweet of 16 April 2019 states. Moreover, that cynical posturing underscores the futility of pursuing the claim when the claimant claims he can readily dispose of the issue of truth.

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Should your client decline, once again, to come good on his promise by providing the requested proof within 21 days, he will need to give a very convincing explanation as to (a) why he declines to do so and (b) exactly when he intends or expects to provide the proof. Subject to the adequacy of that explanation, our client reserves the right to apply to court early next term for a direction that your client provide the “proof” promised in Mr Ayre’s 16 April 2019 tweet and, that if he does not do so, that the claim be struck out or stayed. In light of our client’s above proposal, the question of whether your client’s claim is in fact actionable pursuant to s.1(1) of the Defamation Act 2013 may not have to be tested. Either the litigation will be resolved by satisfactory proof that your client is Satoshi or, failing that, we believe that the court is likely to strike out or stay the claim.

However, we have requested that your client provide the information sought by the Part 18 Request within 21 days of the date of this letter. This is because if the court does not dismiss the claim for abuse of process or stay it, then our client would intend to ask the court for either summary judgment on the issue of serious harm or a trial of a preliminary issue on serious harm if appropriate. The Part 18 Request is intended to give your client the opportunity to avoid such an application by providing proper particularisation of his claim, if he can.

In respect of nine out of the ten statements complained of, both parties rely on innuendo meanings rather than the natural and ordinary meaning of the words. In respect of the tenth, an innuendo meaning is relied on by your client in the alternative to a natural and ordinary meaning. This is therefore not a case where it would be appropriate to postpone service of the Defence for a determination of meaning. To the extent that issues of meaning will arise, it appears that they will need to be determined in light of evidence on matters which will also be relevant to other issues in the case. Moreover, given the relevance to all elements of the Defence of your client’s conduct in May 2016 and the background to that, it is essential for those matters to be set out in a Defence so that the court is fully apprised of the relevant facts in determining the applications we have mooted.

In summary, we are proposing the following next steps:

i.

Within 21 days of this letter your client provides satisfactory and

independently

verifiable proof that he is Satoshi Nakamoto or, failing that provision, he gives the explanation we have sought above.

ii.

Within 21 days of this letter, your client provides answers to the Part 18 Request.

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Subject to your client’s responses to (i) and (ii) our client reserves the right to apply to

iii.

court for an order that the claim be struck out or stayed as an abuse of process and, if that application is not granted, for either summary judgment or a trial of the preliminary issue of serious harm. We accept that, logistically, this is likely to mean having two separate hearings but the logistics can be discussed in due course once your client has engaged with this letter.

Your client’s connection to this jurisdiction We note that in paragraph 1 of the Particulars of Claim it is said that your client is “based” in England, that not being a defined term. In paragraph 27, on the other hand, it says he is “domiciled” here. He claims only to have been living here since December 2015 after the tax authority raids in Australia. His address on the claim form is at Cobham, Surrey, whereas we understand that in court documents in the Kleiman proceedings in Florida he gave a different address in England. Paragraph 27 also states that your client’s “centre of interests” lies in this jurisdiction. However we note that he is Australian and also has close connections to Antigua (as does Mr Ayre).

You will appreciate that the above contentions raise more questions than they answer in respect of your client’s claimed connection to this jurisdiction. We therefore ask him to answer the following questions:

a.

What is meant by “based in” in paragraph 1?

b.

What is the address of his residence in England?

c.

Does your client own any property located in this jurisdiction (and if so, what property)?

d.

Does your client own any other assets located in this jurisdiction (and if so, what assets)?

e.

What if any business interests does your client have in this jurisdiction, providing the names and registration details of any relevant companies, if applicable.

f.

How is your client funding this claim?

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g.

What are your client's connections to Antigua? He has claimed to be Antiguan; does he hold Antiguan citizenship?

h.

Has your client taken any steps which would prevent our client enforcing an adverse costs order, by your client's use of trusts or by acquiring diplomatic status like Calvin Ayre claims to have in Antigua?

Our client is entitled to all the above information for the purpose of considering whether, if the proceedings proceed, he should seek an order for security for his costs.

Yours faithfully

RPC Enc.

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