In December 2010, a federal district court jury in New York convicted former Goldman Sachs computer programmer Sergey Aleynikov of stealing a huge portion of the Wall Street bank’s proprietary, high-frequency trading (HFT) software code to aid his new employer. It sentenced him to eight years in prison. Federal prosecutors heralded the verdict as an example of the government’s crackdown on employees who steal valuable company information in digital form.
But on Feb. 16, in an unusual move, a 2nd Circuit three-judge panel reversed the judgment just hours after oral arguments and ordered the defendant released. On April 11, the 2nd Circuit released its full opinion in U.S. v. Aleynikov.
