比特币硬盘🗑️：英国法院驳回一名男子在垃圾填埋场寻找包含其财富的设备的请求

詹姆斯·豪厄尔斯 (James Howells) 对英国南威尔士的纽波特市议会提起法律诉讼，要求他在垃圾场中搜寻包含大量加密货币的丢失硬盘。

A man's bid to search a dumpsite for a hard drive containing his lost cryptocurrency fortune has been denied by a UK court.

一名男子试图在垃圾场中寻找包含他丢失的加密货币财富的硬盘，但被英国法院驳回。

James Howells launched legal action against Newport city council in south Wales, seeking permission to scour a landfill for a lost hard drive containing a vast sum of bitcoin.

詹姆斯·豪厄尔斯 (James Howells) 对南威尔士的纽波特市议会发起了法律诉讼，寻求许可在垃圾填埋场搜寻丢失的包含大量比特币的硬盘。

The computer expert had about $700 million in his bitcoin wallet, which was safely stored on a hard drive until 2013, when the device and his fortune ended up in the dump.

这位计算机专家的比特币钱包里有大约 7 亿美元，这些钱一直安全地存储在硬盘上，直到 2013 年，该设备和他的财富最终被扔进了垃圾场。

The 39-year-old said he had placed the precious cargo in a black bag during an office spring clean and left it in the hallway of his home.

这位 39 岁的男子说，他在办公室春季大扫除期间将这些珍贵的货物放入一个黑色袋子中，然后将其留在家中的走廊上。

It is believed his then partner mistook the bag for trash and took it to the dump, where she disposed of it.

据信，他当时的伴侣误认为这个袋子是垃圾，并将其带到垃圾场，并在那里处理掉。

Mr Howells discovered the catastrophic error and spent over 10 years pleading with his local authority to help him retrieve it, even offering to share 25 percent of its astronomical sum if the council permitted him to dig it out.

豪厄尔斯先生发现了这个灾难性的错误，并花了 10 多年的时间恳求当地政府帮助他找回它，甚至提出如果议会允许他将其挖出来，他甚至愿意分享 25% 的天文数字。

“I had two identical hard drives and I threw out the wrong one,” Mr Howells told The Guardian in 2021. "I have to laugh about it now.”

2021 年，豪厄尔斯先生对《卫报》表示：“我有两个一模一样的硬盘，但我扔掉了一个错误的硬盘。现在我不得不一笑置之。”

He maintained that the search would not be a 'needle in a haystack' scenario, as trash bins were assigned serial numbers and buried in the landfill with a grid reference.

他坚持认为，搜索不会是“大海捞针”的情况，因为垃圾箱被分配了序列号，并通过网格参考埋在垃圾填埋场中。

Mr Howells and his lawyers said this enabled him to pinpoint roughly where the hard drive was buried, and expert excavators could then extract it.

豪厄尔斯先生和他的律师表示，这使他能够大致查明硬盘埋藏的位置，然后专家挖掘机就可以将其挖掘出来。

“If I could access the landfill records, I could identify the week that I threw the hard drive away, identify the serial number of the bin it was in, and identify where the grid reference is located,” he said.

“如果我可以访问垃圾填埋场记录，我就可以确定我扔掉硬盘的那一周，确定它所在垃圾箱的序列号，并确定网格参考的位置，”他说。

Mr Howells even secured financial backing from a hedge fund to cover the search costs, so the council would not have to use any public funds.

豪厄尔斯先生甚至从一家对冲基金获得了财政支持来支付搜寻费用，因此该委员会不必使用任何公共资金。

However, Newport city council has consistently denied his requests, stating that an excavation of the site would violate licensing regulations and cause environmental damage.

然而，纽波特市议会一直拒绝他的请求，称挖掘该地点将违反许可规定并造成环境破坏。

Now, Mr Howells' decade-long quest to salvage the hard drive, which he said has a 'good chance' of still functioning, has been thwarted by a high court judge, who ruled in the council's favor to strike out the claim, according to The Guardian.

现在，豪厄尔斯先生长达十年的努力挽救硬盘，他说硬盘很有可能仍然可以发挥作用，但现在却遭到高等法院法官的阻挠，法官做出了有利于委员会的裁决，驳回了这一主张。给《卫报》。

At a hearing on Thursday, Judge Keyser KC stated that there were 'no reasonable grounds' for bringing the claim and that Mr Howells had 'no realistic prospect of succeeding' if the case proceeded to trial.

在周四的听证会上，法官 Keyser KC 表示，提出索赔“没有合理的理由”，而且如果案件进入审判阶段，豪厄尔斯先生“没有成功的现实前景”。

James Goudie KC, representing the council, argued that the hard drive became the council's property when it entered the dump and that environmental permits prohibited any excavations of the site.

代表该委员会的詹姆斯·古迪·KC (James Goudie KC) 辩称，该硬盘在进入垃圾场时就成为了该委员会的财产，并且环境许可证禁止对该地点进行任何挖掘。

The judge said he agreed with this argument and that Mr Howells was not entitled to retrieve the hard drive.

法官表示他同意这一论点，并且豪威尔斯先生无权取回硬盘。

Mr Howells has speculated that by 2026, the bitcoins on his missing hard drive could reach the billion mark, and he vowed to pursue his case in the supreme court.

豪厄尔斯先生推测，到 2026 年，他丢失的硬盘上的比特币可能会达到十亿大关，他发誓要向最高法院提起诉讼。

Reacting to the decision, Mr Howells said he was 'very upset,' according to BBC News.

据英国广播公司新闻报道，豪厄尔斯先生对这一决定表示“非常沮丧”。

"This ruling has taken everything from me and left me with nothing. It's the great British injustice system striking again," he added.

“这项裁决夺走了我的一切，让我一无所有。这是英国伟大的不公正制度再次袭来，”他补充道。