Newsgroup: it.sport.formula1.moderato
Titolo: [ENG] The FIA goes into action in the Ferrari-Coughlan Affair

Source: 
grandprix.com
http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns19401.html
The FIA World Motor Sport Council has requested that respresentatives of
the Vodafone McLaren Mercedes appear before an extraordinary meeting of
the FIA World Motor Sport Council in Paris on Thursday, July 26. They
have been asked to answer "a charge" that the team breached Article 151c
of the International Sporting Code between March and July by having
unauthorised possession of documents and confidential information
belonging to Scuderia Ferrari Marlboro. The FIA statement said that this
included information that could be used "to design, engineer, build,
check, test, develop and/or run a 2007 Ferrari Formula 1 car".
Article 151c of the International Sporting Code states that competitor
can be punished for "any fraudulent conduct or any act prejudicial to the
interests of any competition or to the interests of motor sport
generally".
McLaren has said that it will provide whatever is needed by the FIA to
demonstrate that none of the information that was in the possession of
Coughlan was used in any way on the McLaren. It is, of course, arguable
that the data would be of any use at all to a team that is developing a
very different car, beyond being of interest to show what Ferrari was up
to.
The data that was found in Coughlan's possession would have been much
more interesting to a team that might need to design and build a car from
scratch.
Much has been made of the details of when Coughlan received the data and
whether/when he showed it to anyone else at McLaren. If other team
members did see the data and did not report it to either the police or
Ferrari (within a suitable timeframe) then they are in the same boat as
Coughlan and McLaren must answer for this. Article 3.1 of the Formula 1
Sporting Regulations states that "it is the competitor's responsibility
to ensure that all persons concerned by his entry observe all the
requirements of the Agreement, the Code, the Technical Regulations and
the Sporting Regulations".
The defence that junior members of the team did not inform the top
management of what was happening is not, apparently, acceptable although
those with long memories will remember 1994 when Benetton F1 escaped
punishment for illegally tampering with its refuelling equipment, by
admitting the charge and throwing itself on the mercy of the court. The
FIA agreed to let the team off the hook because the changes had been made
by "a junior employee".
That same defence did not work a year later, however, when the Toyota
rally team admitted using illegal turbo restrictors on the Catalunya
Rally in Spain.
"Toyota said the decision had been made at a certain level of the team
and that the management had not known about it," Max Mosley said at the
time, "but the team has to take responsibility."
Toyota was excluded from the World Rally Championship for a year.
Oddly, the question of the FIA punishing espionage did not come up
earlier this year when there was another case, dating back to 2002,
involving Ferrari and Toyota. Ferrari complained to the Italian
authorities that its data had been transferred to Toyota. An Italian
police investigation resulted in two former Ferrari employees: Angelo
Santini and Mauro Iacconi, being indicted on charges of stealing
information from the Ferrari F1 team and giving it to Toyota. The German
police charged several Toyota team members, but they have yet to be
indicted, pending the end of the Italian investigation. In Italy Iacconi
and Santini were found guilty of industrial espionage. Santini was
condemned to a suspended sentence of nine months in prison by the
Tribunale di Modena, while Iacconi was given a suspended 16 month
sentence.
Print News Story
Copyright 1988-2007, Inside F1, Inc.
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 scratch.
Tipo il team Prodrive che è iscritto per il 2008 ?

Vixen wrote:

Mah, per come eravamo rimasti nel 2008 si può semplicemente comprare la 
macchina da qualcun'altro e si pensava che Prodrive avrebbe fatto 
correre delle McLaren...
-- 
Alessio F. Bragadini            
ale...@sevenseas.org
"I think it's a clear indication for the future that we've got to get
out of this corner that we've painted ourselves into, because you can't
race these cars. It's more about pitstops and maybe the driver in front
making a mistake than actual racing now."  -- Ross Brawn, 2005