Irish investigators recover another 500 BTC from Clifton Collins stash, reaching 1,500 total

Ireland's Criminal Assets Bureau said on Thursday, July 2, that it had recovered a further 500 bitcoin identified as proceeds of crime, the third such seizure from a cache once controlled by convicted drug trafficker Clifton Collins. The CAB, working with Europol's European Cybercrime Centre, has now clawed back 1,500 BTC from the case — worth over $92 million at the prices cited in The Block's reporting.

The bitcoin traces to a set of 12 wallets that originally held roughly 6,000 BTC. According to The Irish Times, cited by The Block, Collins — described as a former beekeeper — bought the coins in late 2011 and early 2012, when bitcoin traded for a few dollars each, using proceeds from trafficking and growing cannabis. He stored the private keys at a rented property in County Galway. Those keys were reportedly lost after the property was cleared out when Collins went to prison for five years in 2017.

Investigators have unwound the cache in three equal batches: 500 BTC in March, another 500 in May, and this week's 500. Europol said it hosted operational meetings at its headquarters in The Hague and supplied "highly complex technical expertise and decryption resources" to the effort.

Most of the fortune remains beyond reach. On-chain data from Arkham Intelligence shows wallets tagged "Clifton Collins" still holding roughly 4,500 BTC — worth more than $275 million at current prices, per The Block — implying nine of the original 12 wallets are untouched.

Key facts

• 500 BTC recovered in the latest seizure, announced by the CAB on July 2, 2026 (CAB, via The Block).
• 1,500 BTC total recovered across three batches (March, May, and now), worth over $92 million (The Block).
• Original cache: ~6,000 BTC across 12 wallets, bought late 2011–early 2012 (The Irish Times, via The Block).
• ~4,500 BTC (>$275 million) still sits in nine dormant wallets tagged "Clifton Collins" (Arkham Intelligence, via The Block).
• Europol's European Cybercrime Centre provided decryption resources and hosted meetings in The Hague (Europol, via The Block).

The real-world read

Two things worth flagging. First, the exact mechanism is unstated: The Block reports Europol provided "decryption resources," but neither the CAB nor Europol explains how investigators regained access to keys that were supposedly lost — whether recovered physically, brute-forced, or reconstructed. Treat the "lost keys" narrative as the account on record, not a verified technical fact. Second, the wallet totals rest on Arkham's address tagging; the ~4,500 BTC figure is only as reliable as that attribution. The internal-party framing here is minimal — this is law enforcement announcing its own win, so the tidy three-for-three recovery cadence and the round 500-coin batches are worth a raised eyebrow, though the sources don't contradict each other on the numbers.

Coverage here rests on a single secondary outlet (The Block) relaying the CAB, Europol, Arkham, and The Irish Times; the primary agency statements were not independently reviewed.

This is news, not financial advice.