We've seen some interesting cases recently of employees facing charges that they stole proprietary data in order to start a company or to help them in a new job. One high profile case was that of former Goldman Sachs programmer Sergey Aleynikov, who was convicted and sentenced to eight years of hard time in March. But the Jeffery Gundlach case takes this to a whole new level.

The "King of Bonds" has been accused by his former employer, Trust Company of the West (TCW), of stealing proprietary trading platforms and confidential customer data to help start a new firm after he was fired in 2009. The trial is now underway in Los Angeles. According to the New York Times, lawyers for TCW have sought to portray Gundlach as a "brash renegade" who plotted with others to steal critical data. Three employees of TCW have admitted to downloading information before they were fired, and the plaintiffs contend they did so at the behest of the mastermind, Gundlach. The plaintiff is also attempting to show that the system in use at Gundlach's Doubleline Capital were based on the TCW systems.

Both sides are playing hardball. TCW has tried to introduce such things as the drugs and porn films that were found in Gundlach's office as evidence. Gunndlach has fired back with a few lawsuits of his own, seeking $375 million in compensatory and punitive damages. This will be ugly to watch unfold, as both sides go for the jugular. But even in the staid fixed-income mutual fund industry, people will be rubber-necking.

For more:
- here's the Times article