Noah Doe Plaintiffs File Suit to Claim Dormant Bitcoin as Lost Property
Anonymous plaintiffs filed a New York action seeking declaratory ownership of dormant Bitcoin addresses under a lost-property theory. The March filing initially named John Does 1-1,332 and became the opening legal stage of a case later expanded to tens of thousands of addresses, including addresses associated with Satoshi-era coins.
On March 11, 2026, plaintiffs using the names ABC Company, XYZ Company and Noah Doe filed an action in New York Supreme Court against John Does 1-1,332. The plaintiffs sought a declaratory judgment claiming ownership rights over dormant bitcoin under a theory that the coins could be treated as lost property.
The case grew out of an unusual effort to assert constructive possession over long-inactive Bitcoin addresses. The original March complaint was much narrower than the version that later attracted attention: on May 1 the plaintiffs amended the case to expand the defendant set to 39,069 addresses, followed later in May by an attempt to serve those addresses through Bitcoin OP_RETURN transactions.
March 11 is therefore historically distinct from the later May expansion. It marks the moment the ownership theory moved from prior notices and on-chain signaling into court. The case was legally controversial, but its attempt to use conventional lost-property law to claim control over dormant bitcoin—including, later, addresses associated with Satoshi Nakamoto—made the filing significant to Bitcoin's legal history.