Convicted ex-Google engineer, Anthony Lewandowski will get a pardon from the outgoing US President, Donald Trump. The former Google engineer was convicted of stealing trade secrets in what a judge described as the “biggest trade crime I have ever seen”.
Levandowski worked for Google’s self-driving car division, Waymo, before founding his self-driving truck company, Otto. Uber later bought Otto. Lewandowski got 18 months in prison, with Judge William Alsup sentencing the engineer in August 2020.
The engineer posted his gratitude on Twitter, thanking and supporting those who supported and advocated for him.
My family and I are grateful for the opportunity to move forward, and thankful to the President and others who supported and advocated on my behalf.
— Anthony Levandowski (@antlevandowski) January 20, 2021
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Levandowski was found guilty of downloading thousands of files to his laptop before leaving Google. Uber then fired him after the acquisition.
He was also ordered to pay Google $179 million in compensation which is the subject of another suit against Uber as he claims that the ride-hailing company, should be liable for the amount. In another suit, Levandowski claims that Uber owes him billions of dollars in lost value from the Otto deal.
Lewandowski has not served a day from his sentence as the judge allowed a delay due to the COVID-19 pandemic. A statement from the White House says that Levandowski’s pardon got the support of figures from the tech industry. They include controversial billionaire investor Peter Thiel, fellow Founders Fund partner, Trae Stephens, Thiel Capital COO, Blake Masters, Hollywood agent, and Palantir advisor Michael Ovitz, and Oculus and Anduril founder, Palmer Luckey.
72 other people also got a pardon from President Trump, commuting the sentence of another 70. They include rappers Lil Wayne and Kodad Black
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