KEY POINTS:
Nigel Stepney, the man at the centre of F1's espionage furore, says he is the victim of a witch-hunt by Ferrari aimed at discrediting him and making an example of anyone who tries to leave the Scuderia.
Denying categorically any wrongdoing, Stepney said: "Ferrari are terrified that
what I have in my mind is valuable. I guess I know where the bodies have been buried for the last 10 years, there were a lot of controversies."
Stepney accused the team of having him followed, and of monitoring his every move once he made it clear in March that he wanted to leave.
"I started to get the blame for things, and began to feel framed I have been accused, but have not been charged with anything. There is just an investigation. I feel like I am in the wilderness.
"I was aware there was a problem at Ferrari last September, when Ross Brawn announced his sabbatical. The structure was changing. I wanted a job similar to Ross's, which had evolved over 10 years.
"I still wanted to run the test and race teams and to report to Aldo Costa, the chief designer. He was the right person to report to, not [the new technical director] Mario Almondo, who was a human resources appointment. I thought having to report to him, and several others, was a backward step. I had previously only reported to Ross, and we had a great one-to-one relationship. He gave me a lot of support and guidance."
In mid-February, Stepney told the team principal, Jean Todt, that he did not want to travel any more.
"Ferrari took that badly. I began to feel like I was some sort of traitor, just because I no longer wanted to travel.
"On 17 May there were legal moves against me by Ferrari. People were taken from the factory to the Carabinieri [police] headquarters to be interviewed, but no charges were made against anyone. My house in Serramazzoni has been raided twice. After that I called Todt to say I was going on holiday [to the Philippines] and wouldn't be coming back until this was all sorted out. We haven't spoken since.
"I have been followed, and so have my fiancee [Ash] and daughter [Sabine]. There have been high-speed chases. Ash has been stalked at the house. There was tracking gear on my car. When we cornered some guys last Thursday evening they refused to speak. I don't believe they were journalists."
Stepney denies he copied the drawings allegedly found at the McLaren chief designer Mike Coughlan's house last week, but admits that they met in Spain's Port Ginesta on 28 April and had a meeting with Honda's team principal, Nick Fry, on 1 June.
"Initially I wasn't looking anywhere else and neither was Mike, but he was unhappy with the McLaren management. Then three or four people at Ferrari indicated to me after reading stories of my approach to Honda that they'd be interested in joining a technical group to go to another team. They wanted to follow us to go into a structure in which they felt comfortable.
"I categorically deny that any technical information passed between Mike and I during any of our meetings. We mainly discussed the sort of infrastructure and tools we would need to get the job done in another team.
"Reacting to the inevitable connection that people have formed between his meetings with Coughlan and the copied Ferrari papers, Stepney said: "I admit it looks blatantly obvious, but something is happening inside Ferrari. I was accused by Mario Almondo of taking some drawings. I had them in my possession legitimately because I needed them for work, but it was reported to him by the drawing office that I had them. I got the papers and threw them on Almondo's desk. The next day they were back on mine.
"I categorically deny that I copied them, or that I sent them to Mike Coughlan. I knew I was being watched all the time at the factory, and that everything I did or said was being reported back, and that people knew whenever I accessed files on the computer.
"I put a lot of the systems and working practices in place at Ferrari, relating to the operations of the test and race teams and the preparation of the cars, information I'm told was supposed to be in the documents. So if I already had that material in my head, why would I need it all again? I was never a yes man, and as soon as I went against the system at Ferrari, I got squeezed.
"Ferrari is unique in Italy, it's a religion. If you go against it, it's like going against the Vatican."
- THE INDEPENDENT
