- Ireland‘s Criminal Assets Bureau (CAB) has accessed a cryptocurrency wallet containing 500 Bitcoin, valued at $34 million.
- The wallet is the first of 12 seized in 2019 from a convicted cannabis dealer, collectively now worth $418 million.
- Europol provided critical technical expertise to decrypt the wallet after the owner’s claim of losing the keys.
- The Bitcoin represents invested proceeds from a drug business that started in 2011 when prices were under $30.
Ireland’s Criminal Assets Bureau (CAB) has successfully accessed a Bitcoin wallet containing 500 BTC, worth approximately $34 million, marking a significant breakthrough in a multi-year asset recovery case. This represents the first of twelve wallets seized from a drug dealer in 2019, which have since skyrocketed in value to $418 million.
The operation received vital support from Europol’s European Cybercrime Centre, which supplied complex technical and decryption resources. CAB confirmed the 500 BTC accessed are “the proceeds of crime,” according to a Garda statement shared with the Irish Times.
The wallets belonged to Clifton Collins, a former beekeeper jailed for growing cannabis. Collins had invested his drug business profits into Bitcoin starting in 2011, when the cryptocurrency traded for as little as $0.30.
He stored the private keys for his 12 wallets in a document hidden inside a fishing rod case. However, Collins claimed the case was lost after a break-in at his rented property, a story disputed by reports of a clear-out following his arrest.
The original 2019 seizure was valued at $61 million. Consequently, the bureau’s latest 2023 annual report noted previous asset recoveries from Collins included 89 BTC and various vehicles.
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