’Spygate’ protagonist Stepney killed in crash

Nigel Stepney, a man at the heart of F1’s famous ’spygate’ scandal, has died.

The former Ferrari engineer, who left F1 seven years ago after he was accused of leaking information to McLaren and attempting to sabotage Ferrari, was killed in the early hours of Friday when he was struck by a truck.

Britain’s Mirror newspaper said the 56-year-old, who had also worked as an engineer with the great Ayrton Senna at Lotus, had stopped his van on the hard shoulder of a motorway.

"For reasons yet to be established, the man appears to have entered the carriageway and was then in collision with an articulated goods vehicle," Kent Police said.

After leaving F1, Stepney worked in the world of endurance and sports cars.

"JRM regrets to announce that Nigel Stepney, the company’s racing team manager and technical director, was killed in a car accident this morning," his current employers confirmed in a statement.