The Shangshan District Procuratorate in Fuzhou City recently announced a notable case: a man was sentenced to 12 years and 7 months in prison and fined 300,000 yuan for theft related to Bitcoin. The sentence was upheld after an appeal.
According to the prosecution, the defendant took advantage of the opportunity to access the victim's Bitcoin wallet hard drive and computer to steal the Private Key/Secret Key and related data, thereby appropriating 4 Bitcoins and illegally profiting approximately 900,000 yuan (equivalent to about $125,000 USD) at the time of trial.
The most noteworthy aspect of the case lies not in the verdict itself, but in the legal arguments presented by the prosecution. Although current Chinese regulations clearly state that cryptocurrencies do not have legal tender status, the Fuzhou Procuratorate asserted that Bitcoin still meets the general characteristics of "assets" under the Criminal Code, encompassing three elements: having value, being manageable, and being transferable.
Therefore, the agency concluded that Bitcoin falls under the category of property crime and any infringement is subject to criminal prosecution, regardless of the digital asset's legal status within the financial system.
