BLOOMINGTON, Minn. — Italian investigators, accompanied by 50 British police officers, visited the McLaren factory plus the homes of several senior team personnel on Feb. 27. They were searching for evidence to see just how far the leaked Ferrari confidential data permeated into the McLaren team.
McLaren cooperated fully as the authorities looked into paper documents, e-mail and telephone systems and computers at the factory and in the homes of team Principal Ron Dennis, COO Martin Whitmarsh, Managing Director Jonathan Neale, Design Team Leader Rob Taylor and Engineering Director Paddy Lowe.
Initially, a statement by Italian police was misconstrued to have them saying that they had found new incriminating evidence.
That drew the ire of McLaren, which said it might ask for government intervention by the British Home Office.
“McLaren Racing wishes to record its extreme displeasure with the wording of a statement that the Italian Police are reported to have made yesterday,” a McLaren statement said. “If those reports accurately reflect the police statement, the statement is grossly inaccurate and misleading. The reports incorrectly claim that the searches produced material which clearly shows the responsibility of certain people at McLaren Racing.”
“It should be noted,” the statement added, “that none of the extensive searches or investigations completed to date have produced any evidence that the Ferrari documents which Mr. Nigel Stepney handed over to Mr. Michael Coughlan were ever passed to anyone else at McLaren Racing or used on the McLaren F-1 car.”
In fact, what the Italian statement actually said was that the newly obtained information would now be studied by Italian and British police “with the aim of finding possible traces of the crimes concerned in the investigation.”
“Such findings,” the statement said, “will be added to vast circumstantial and factual evidence already collected in the criminal investigation coordinated by the Modena Attorney, which shows clearly the responsibility of the management and some technicians at a high level in McLaren for the occurrence of  ‘industrial espionage’ against team Ferrari, as well as for the matter of having taken advantage — both from a business and sporting level — of the data and information regarding both the design of the car that contested in the 2007 F-1 World Championship, and the race and qualifying strategies of the Italian team.”
McLaren says it would be extremely surprised if the review of the documents reveals anything which has not already been disclosed as a result of the extensive investigations already carried out.