James Howells, the man who lost a hard drive with millions of dollars worth of Bitcoin in a landfill, has received another blow to this plea. According to BBC reports, Howells’ plea has been rejected and dismissed by the judge.
Howells was attempting to sue the local authorities in order to gain access to the property to search for this hard disk or obtain compensation for his 8000 Bitcoins.
Howells’ Claims Get Rejected By The Judge: What Did The Authorities Say?
James Howells had claimed that he wished to visit the landfill and retrieve the hard disk after his ex-partner inadvertently disposed of the hard disk containing it in 2013.
However, Newport Council requested that a judge in the High Court reject Mr. Howells’ lawsuit to gain access to the dump or receive £495 million in damages.
According to Judge Keyser KC, there were “no realistic prospect” of winning a full trial and no “reasonable grounds” for making the claim.
The court also stated in a written ruling that they also believe there is no other strong reason why the claim should be decided at trial and that it would not have a realistic chance of winning if it went to trial.
The council representative James Goudie KC had argued that the hard drive had already been its property when it entered the dump according to existing rules.
Additionally, it stated that any attempt to excavate the location in order to look for the hard drive would be prohibited under its environmental permissions.
How did Howells Loose The Hard Drive?
Back in 2013, Howells, an IT engineer, unintentionally threw away the hard drive while doing a standard house cleaning. The mother of Howells’ two teenage sons, Eddy-Evans, also came out and acknowledged her involvement in the event.
She clarified that she had grudgingly agreed to Howells’ request to dispose of a number of things, including the hard drive.
The 8,000 Bitcoins on the abandoned hard drive were only a small portion of their current value at the time, when the cryptocurrency was valued less than $1.
However, with the current price of Bitcoin, the holdings are worth over $600 million.
Was The Search Impossible?
Although there are about 1.4 million tonnes of rubbish at the dump, Mr. Howells claimed to have reduced the size of the hard drive to an area with 100,000 tons.
However, the the laws regarding the search seem to prohibit Howells from searching for his Bitcoin filled hard drive.