A U.S. appeals court has finalized the legal proceedings to officially seize 69,370 Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies linked to the defunct dark web marketplace Silk Road. The U.S. District Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit confirmed the transfer of Bitcoin assets to federal control, following a previous ruling affirming the government’s claim to the digital assets associated with Silk Road’s illicit activities. The confiscated Bitcoin includes Bitcoin gold (BTG), Bitcoin SV (BSV), and Bitcoin Cash (BCH), in addition to Bitcoin.
The U.S. court initially issued the judgment in August, upholding the U.S. Justice Department’s 2020 seizure and subsequent motion for the official forfeiture of the cryptocurrency. At the time of the 2020 complaint, the seized Bitcoin’s value exceeded $1 billion. The U.S. government had gained possession of the cryptocurrency surrendered by “Individual X,” who had hacked into Silk Road and taken control of its funds.
James Zhong, identified as the Silk Road hacker, was sentenced to a year in federal prison in April 2022. In July, a cryptocurrency wallet linked to the U.S. Department of Justice conducted transactions moving about 9,825.25 Bitcoin valued at approximately $299 million, connected to Silk Road.
Analysts closely monitor these fund movements as market participants speculate about the potential impact of any significant sale by the U.S. government on Bitcoin’s price. Silk Road’s founder, Ross Ulbricht, sentenced to life in prison, agreed in 2022 to use $3 billion worth of stolen Bitcoin to settle his debt to the U.S. government and waived his claim to 69,470 Bitcoin.
