Personal information was to be sold to a German Magazine

May 13, 2008 14:18 GMT  ·  By

Lewis Hamilton and his friend from the Force India F1 racing team, Adrian Sutil, have recently made the headlines because of a blackmail plot. According to the British Telegraph, police in Germany have arrested a man who was trying to sell personal information on Adrian Sutil to a magazine. The information was kept on a computer disc, which the police found on the arrested man.

The Bavarian police stated that the man identified as "Dieter" was already known to the police department. He was caught while allegedly trying to sell a disc containing information about the 24-year-old German racer to a magazine. If he was to get away, he would have received approximately ?8,000 for the disc. The disc is said to contain Sutil's financial transactions in Switzerland and private e-mails between him and his friend Lewis Hamilton. It has also been rumored that private pictures were involved, but not of Hamilton or of sensitive nature.

According to the British newspaper, the man was caught with the help of the magazine he was trying to sell the disc to. After the police were tipped off by the magazine's editor, a rendezvous was arranged between "Dieter" and undercover detectives. The arrest was carried forth this weekend on the A9 autobahn near Munich. If the man is found guilty, he faces up to five years in jail.

It appears that Adrian's father, Jorge, was responsible for ditching the computer, a while back. According to Adrian, the hard disc his father sold was later taken by someone who recognized him, in an attempt to profit off the F1 racer's image. The man's attempt only lasted four days before the police caught him.

The British racing star had nothing to comment about the recent incident and, as of now, not even a fragment of the personal information included on the disc has been leaked.