Irish police recently announced that they successfully cracked one of 12 Bitcoin wallets associated with a convicted drug dealer. This Bitcoin wallet was previously considered “unreachable,” but now Irish authorities have cracked it and seized 500 Bitcoins.
It is reported that these assets are criminal proceeds, and the case involves convicted Irish drug dealer Clifton Collins. Based on the current Bitcoin price of $71,254.13 per coin, these 500 Bitcoins are worth over $35.6 million.
The Criminal Assets Bureau (CAB) of Ireland stated that, with the assistance of Europol’s European Cybercrime Centre, they successfully gained control of the wallet. The police announced that Europol held operational meetings at its headquarters in The Hague and provided investigators and analysts with “highly complex technical expertise and decryption resources,” which was key to the success of this operation.
“Reemergence” May Not Be Limited to Just 500 Bitcoins
According to the Irish Times, these 12 wallets collectively hold 6,000 Bitcoins. When seized in 2019, they were valued at approximately €53 million, but due to lost private keys, authorities had been unable to access the assets for years.
The case’s main figure, Clifton Collins, was previously sentenced to five years in prison for growing and selling marijuana. Between 2011 and 2012, Collins used drug proceeds to purchase about 6,000 Bitcoins, which he stored across 12 wallets. He printed the private keys on an A4 sheet of paper and hid it inside an aluminum cover of a fishing rod case. However, after he was imprisoned, his landlord cleared out his rental property, discarded his personal belongings, and they were subsequently burned. The lost private keys meant that, even if the police seized the wallets, they had been unable to access the assets for several years.
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