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Journal tomhudson's Journal: Stupid former boss trix: threats of cops and a lawsuit 10

Journal by tomhudson
A new issue.

Since I won't turn over the source code for work I did at home overnight and weekends last year that I never got paid for, but which he sold on to his biggest customer for several grand, and they're ready to pay another $4k - $8k in updates and additions, he's threatening to call the police to get back "his" files. Talk about greedy.

Hey buddy, it's a civil, not criminal, issue. The police will tell you to talk to a lawyer.

And of course he's claiming I'm damaging his reputation by telling people that he bounced my pay checks, filed GPL licenses off of code I wrote before I ever worked there, etc. And that he's going to sue me.

I told him that I would welcome an opportunity to get everything on the public record. How he not only bounced my paychecks, but never paid any overtime or statutory holidays (both required by law), how he reneged on the salary we had negotiated, how he tried to appropriate my work without compensation, and don't get me started on his billing practices ...

So, since he needs it to be able to sell his customer the promised upgrades, I told him to make me an offer. Otherwise, since I have no further use for it, and the source is fugly-smelly-ashamed-to-show-it-in-public-like-dirty-underwear, and DENSE - I'm deleting it. The clean portions of the code were derived from my puzzle program, which was written several months before I started working for him. Clearly I own that portion as well.

After all, if anyone were to ask me to update it, I would do a rewrite from scratch anyway.

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Stupid former boss trix: threats of cops and a lawsuit

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  • And of course he's claiming I'm damaging his reputation by telling people that he bounced my pay checks, filed GPL licenses off of code I wrote before I ever worked there, etc. And that he's going to sue me.

    If it's true, it's not libel or slander, and he doesn't have a leg to stand on. You are simply a victim, a whistleblower, and a defrauded employee. I would say encourage him to continue the crap, since it seems like he is foolishly digging his own grave by giving you more ammunition at every turn.

    Now, if

    • He is an idiot, and I think he's pretty much at the end of his rope.

      As for the "spoliation of evidence" thing, I've made it clear to him that, while he has no rights to it, he is free to make an offer, but that if he doesn't, I have no reason whatsoever to keep it, since I'm moving to a new software platform and the old code is of no interest to me anyway - it's fugly and I would have to pretty much want to do a rewrite it anyway, so why not just do it from scratch and not have any possible claims against

  • Don't delete it. Yet. Just don't. In the event that dummyhead actually lawyers up with competent staff, that deletion gets painted as destruction of evidence.
    • I've told him that if he wants it, he can pay for it, but that I'm not going to give it to him for free. It's not his, and I'd like to see how he explains to a judge that I should just give him stuff he didn't pay for. It's impossible that it was created at work - the executable, which he has, has the software version number embedded in it, and it's too OLD to have been made on one of the office machines.

      If he wants it, he can either spend $5k - $10k on his lawyer to have a judge tell him that he has to

    • Agreed. You may need to be able to prove you actually did the work for which he did not pay you. Delete it, and you enable his libel/slander claim.

      • I told him to have his lawyer send me a demand letter, and I would be very happy to lay out my reasons.

        You should have seen him. I thought he was going to pop a gasket.

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