RUSSIA COMPUTER HARD DRIVE STOLEN CONTAINING INFORMATION ON SCHOOL BEING USED AS EVIDENCE IN DISPUTE CASE WITH MICROSOFT School Principal Refuses to Make Terms with Microsoft - Kommersant Moscow

Feb. 13, 2007

School Principal Refuses to Make Terms with Microsoft
Principal of Sepychevskaya village school Alexander Ponosov, charged with using pirated Windows software, refused yesterday to make terms with Microsoft company. If Ponosov had agreed to apologize to the company, the criminal case would have been closed. Meanwhile, the process becomes more and more notorious: someone stole one of the 12 hard disks of the school’scomputers, which was the material evidence for the case.

Representative of Microsoft company Alexander Potapov offered to school principal Alexander Ponosov to make terms and end the trial, during hearings yesterday. The principal was to publicly pledge guilty of using unlicensed software and repent.

However, Ponosov said yesterday he has nothing to apologize for, because he did not know that pirated programs were installed in school computers. Thus, if he agreed to coming to terms with Microsoft, it would actually mean his pleading guilty.

Prosecutor Alexander Troyanov said that after the principal’s refusal to terminate the case, the process will be carried through to the sentence. It will be a fine rather than imprisonment.

The case became aggravated by Ponosov’s announcement that someone had stolen one of the 12 hard disks of the school’s computers, which was the material evidence for the case. Prosecution immediately pointed out to the judge that the material evidence was handed to Ponosov, and that he was personally responsible for their safe-keeping.