'Stepneygate': Sabotage and espionage rock F1
July 5th 2007 14:46
Sabotaged and exposed?
However, in the past couple of days, the plot has unravelled further and delved into some genuinely controversial issues with some potentially vast consequences.
Several weeks back, Ferrari launched an investigation against Stepney, who was then employed as head of performance, a position created by Ferrari when the former technical chief voiced his desire to leave the team at the end of last season.
Ferrari launched the investigation for ‘undisclosed reasons’, and claimed, “It is not related to any event, it is related to his behaviour."
The Englishman denied any wrongdoing from his holiday in the Philippines, claiming Ferrari were undertaking a ‘dirty tricks campaign’ against him.
Nigel Stepney
With so few details available to the public, the story fell away into the background, with most assuming Ferrari were being overly paranoid at Stepney’s unsettledness.
However, the story resurfaced on the 3rd July, when Stepney was fired from the Scuderia, with the explanation emerging that he was behind a sabotage attempt, in which a suspicious white substance was found within the fuel tanks of the Ferrari’s prior to the Monaco Grand Prix.
Then, the following day, the plot thickened immeasurably, when championship rivals, McLaren reported that they had suspended a senior technical staff member, believed to be chief designer, Mike Coughlan, after Ferrari had launched an investigation against Stepney and an unnamed McLaren engineer relating to the theft of technical information.
In a press release, McLaren promised full cooperation in the proceedings and stated, "The team has learnt that this individual had personally received a package of technical information from a Ferrari employee at the end of April.”
Mike Coughlan
The same day, the Times reported that British police searched Coughlan’s home in Surry, at the request of Ferrari, and allegedly found hundreds of drawings and blueprints of Ferrari’s F2007.
“We have proof that Stepney had been supplying technical information to a McLaren employee and we found evidence of that fact in his [the employee's] home," said a Ferrari spokesman.
"This is a very serious situation. We are talking about a lot of information being given to a prominent McLaren engineer. We are not talking here about rumours or speculation," said the Ferrari source.
With such classified information at the fingertips of a senior employee for several months, McLaren will have to prove that none of this information was used to benefit the Woking team.
So in the space of a couple of days, what started as a rather hazy dispute between employer and employee has erupted into one of the most controversial cases in the sport’s recent history.
Ferrari are on the warpath, Stepney faces a double-barrelled legal investigation, for sabotage and espionage, and McLaren are straining to distance themselves from Coughlan – insisting they never used the stolen classified information from Ferrari.
Of course, the FIA has jumped into the row, and have launched their own investigation into both the Ferrari sabotage claims, and the Ferrari/McLaren espionage case.
However, the FIA’s endeavour is to determine whether either party has breached the International Sporting Code, or the Formula One Regulations.
Keep your enemies closer
With both the Modena Court and the British High Court investigating the cases, as well as the FIA, all parties concerned are required to suppress information to the public, which leaves us in the dark and desperate to understand just what will come of it all.
With the FIA possessing the power to completely exclude a team from the Championship, McLaren are facing a worst case scenario of seeing their promising title bid flushed away with a case of industrial espionage.
Although Bernie Ecclestone has dismissed suggestions that McLaren drivers, Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso, who sit first and second on the table, will be stripped of points already earned, he failed to deny that the McLaren men could face future penalty as a result of the matter that sits before the team.
Ferrari will be going for the kill, watch this space. The championship may depend on it.
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