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Sergey strikes back
The case of Sergey Aleynikov, the former Goldman Sachs programmer charged with stealing some of the top secret code to the investment bank’s high-frequency trading program, is going on the offensive.
Aleynikov has filed a subpoena on his former employer, seeking access to some information–mainly his personnel file. And Goldman has responded by filing a motion in federal court to quash the subpoena. Goldman filed its motion on Aug. 6, a source familiar with the matter says.
A hearing on Goldman’s motion to put the kibosh on Aleynikov’s request for documents will be heard Monday afternoon beofre Judge Paul Crotty.
The hearing on Aleynikov’s motion comes as the attorney for the former Goldman employee and federal prosecutors continue to work towards trying to reach a potential plea deal in the case.
I’m trying to a copy of Goldman’s motion. At this point, we don’t know what information Aleynikov is seeking. But this could be a hot hearing.
UPDATE: Just got a copy of Goldman’s motion and it appears much of what Aleynikov wants are personnel records regarding ”performance reviews by peers and superiors, complaints, employee progress reports, training history records” etc.
Goldman says Aleynikov’s request should be denied because the “crux of the complaint is an allegation of theft, not an employment or wage dispute.”
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The Wall
Ctan – downloading, accessing or otherwise using code or coding reference techniques at work is regular feature of any IT programming job. IT systems are built of various parts of which very little tends to be custom code – even in the case of cutting-edge stock trading systems. The underlying architecture will always have common principals with other types of system.
The truth is someone like Aleynikov could easily re-write his own code in a superior form anyway – something that Goldman will never be able to prevent, no matter how much they try.