Gopal

Appellant Peter K. Gopal, together with Lee Yamada, Jim Catanich, and Andrew Moore, was indicted in 1978 on a total of 23 counts relating to events surrounding the alleged theft of trade secrets from Silicon Valley firms manufacturing semiconductors and computer chip devices. In essence, the investigation involved a “sting” operation in which appellant offered to sell and then delivered stolen property to corporate security officers resulting in his arrest, the issuance of a search warrant, and the seizure of additional stolen property.

After lengthy pretrial proceedings and a 31-day court trial, appellant was found guilty of conspiracy to commit a crime (Pen. Code, §§ 182/496), offering a bribe to acquire a trade secret (§ 499c, subd. (c)), and four counts of possession of stolen property (§ 496). He was sentenced to two years and eight months in state prison.

I. Facts

A. Introduction

To understand the nature of the stolen property, an elementary description of the manufacturing process of semiconductors may be helpful. At an earlier state of these proceedings, Division One of this court concisely summarized this process as follows:

B. The Prosecution Case

On…