For someone to be charged & convicted for industrial/corporate espionage, what must be proven? The case I have come across is the 2007 McLaren scandal & that resulted in the biggest sporting fine in history, alongside fines and sentences for the individuals involved.
If the documents of technical information never reached McLaren, would Stepney have been guilty for “sabotage, industrial espionage, sporting fraud and attempted serious injury”? If not, what would we have been found guilty for? He still would have had the technical information documents in his possession.
Are there such laws as industrial espionage and sabotage in UK law? Would these matters be civil, rather than criminal? I would think fraud would come into this, but conscious of the CPS standpoint that prosecutors should "be particularly mindful that the criminal law is not invoked by complainants for purely commercial purposes." How would relevant authorities involve themselves with these ‘crimes’, or would they not?
