Question: Bernard von NotHaus (the creator of the [Liberty Dollar](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberty_Dollar)) was convicted of violating a U.S. federal law that forbids the minting of a currency by anyone in the U.S. besides the federal government. Might it be claimed that bitcoins are also a currency and their users or creators violate that same law?

Answer: 
The court where NotHaus was tried is a District court (trial court). In the US federal system, trial court decisions are *persuasive* authority only - this means that other courts can read them and discuss them and use them as guidance, but they are not required to follow them the way they would be an opinion from a Circuit Court of the US Supreme Court. 

Also, trial courts make two kinds of determinations - regarding *issues of law*, and *issues of fact*. 

Issues of fact are going to be specific to that particular case and aren't meaningfully precedent for any other circumstance. An example would be "we find that Col. Mustard killed Miss Scarlet in the kitchen with a lead pipe."

Issues of law could be applied to other cases - e.g., "the Court finds that a lead pipe is a deadly weapon." 

So, it's possible that the court in the NotHaus case ruled on issues of law in a fashion that could be extended to other cases - but many of the rulings were likely very fact-specific (and thus inapplicable to other cases), and even rulings on legal issues will function as suggestions to other trial courts. 

If NotHaus appeals his conviction, the appeal is more likely to result in binding precedent; but even that would only be binding on other courts within that appellate circuit, for the rest of the US it would just be persuasive (not mandatory). 

The bare fact that NotHaus was convicted is not, in itself, any sort of legal precedent, though it may be a clue about the US government's feelings about alternative currencies.
There is no evidence to suggest that law applies to Bitcoin. See also [What is the current legal status of Bitcoin?](https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/131/what-is-the-current-legal-status-of-bitcoin-around-the-world)