Iacconi maintains his innocence

Former Ferrari employee Mauro Iacconi still insists he is innocent of charges of stealing design secrets from Ferrari and giving them to the Toyota f1 team, despite being found guilty by a Modena court last week.

"It's true that the Toyota TF103 looked like a copy of the F2002, also because of its red color, but it's normal for F1 cars to resemble the winning machine," Iacconi told Italian newspaper Gazzetta dello Sport.

"In the trial, my last aerodynamic chief at Maranello, Nick Tombazis, defended me by highlighting the fact that the Ferrari parts found in the CD-ROM were obsolete and unusable, so there was no point copying them.

"Who knows, maybe the whole point of the accusation was to put a stop to the brain drain from Ferrari. I'm known in my village for the social work I do; I don't want a stain I don't deserve."

"At 43 years of age I hope I'll be able to find a job soon, even if it's not car-related, just to start over," he added. "This story has burned me out."