Gundlach says TCW allegations involve ‘closed chapters of my life’
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Jeffrey Gundlach, the former TCW Group investment chief who was sued by the firm last week for allegedly stealing massive amounts of the company’s proprietary information and data, struck back today in a letter to clients and potential clients of his new firm.
Gundlach, who was fired by TCW on Dec. 4 and less than two weeks later launched DoubleLine Capital -- with about 40 ex-TCW employees who bolted after he was ousted -- doesn’t use the letter to address the main elements of TCW’s suit, which are theft of trade secrets, breach of fiduciary duty and conspiracy.
He says he has “referred TCW’s unfortunate litigation tactics to my legal team and expect this matter to be handled as a business dispute in the ordinary course.”
The main purpose of the letter appears to be to confront TCW’s allegations that it found hardcore pornography, “sexual devices,” marijuana and drug paraphernalia in Gundlach’s TCW offices after his firing.
From the letter:
A second deeply disturbing element of TCW’s actions has been its invasion and searching of locked drawers in my office at TCW’s headquarters in downtown Los Angeles and of a small personal office I kept in Santa Monica. I personally paid the rent and all other expenses for the operation of this office.After seizing these offices, TCW refused to allow me to collect my personal possessions, and the salacious disclosure in TCW’s lawsuit of certain items apparently taken from there is a transparent attempt to embarrass me and harm my business. While these actions will no doubt be subjects of litigation, suffice it to say that I had every expectation of privacy in these spaces, which stored vestiges of closed chapters of my life. Notwithstanding TCW’s scorched earth legal policy, I am certain that no employee of TCW, past or present, friend or foe, can honestly say that they ever had any experience with me, either in the office, on the road or in any meeting, in which there was any improper activity consistent with the innuendos, smears and gross distortions to which TCW has shamelessly subjected me in its lawsuit.
-- Tom Petruno