Southern District Judge Denise Cote is reserving decision on whether to close portions of the trial of a former Goldman Sachs employee charged with taking the investment bank’s high-frequency computer trading code to his new employer. Sergey Aleynikov is charged with theft of trade secrets for taking the code to his new job at Chicago-based Teza Technologies and federal prosecutors have asked that the judge close the courtroom and keep certain documents relating to Goldman’s trading strategy under seal. Yesterday, Judge Cote said she needed greater “specificity” from the government if she is to properly analyze any prosecution application to close the courtroom. But she said her “hope is that all the testimony will be public.”
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Joseph P. Facciponti and Rebecca A. Rohr submitted motions in limine on Oct. 22 arguing that there were “no reasonable alternatives” to closing the courtroom and “the confidentiality and the government’s effective prosecution of trade secrets are overriding interests that will be prejudiced if the courtroom is not closed.”
