New hire sabotaged our servers on the way out. Boss sued him into oblivion.

So I work at an IT company and I'm posting this because I've literally never seen someone this unhinged.

We had this one new guy who'd been with us for like 3 months. Kid couldn't code for shit but had a massive ego. Any feedback and he'd just sulk and complain like a baby. Classic.

Then last Friday happened. Our team lead looked at his code and was like "dude, this is gonna destroy our server load, rewrite it." Reasonable, right? Well this motherfucker goes to lunch and just... doesn't come back. We're all freaking out calling him all afternoon. Then around quitting time he drops ONE LINE in the group chat: "doesn't seem like a good fit, I'm out. thanks." and GHOSTS.

Honestly we were ready to just chalk it up to "kids these days" and move on.

BUT THEN. Monday morning. We try to log into the main server and it won't open. This absolute MANIAC changed the root password and database access before he dipped. EVERYTHING went down. Customers are screaming at us, the office is in complete meltdown.

Team lead calls him like fifty times, kid blocks him. Finally reaches him on another number. And get THIS. This is the part that made my blood boil.

He's like "well I created those passwords myself so that's MY intellectual property. I did so much work here that I don't feel like sharing for free. Pay me severance plus emotional damages and I'll tell you the passwords."

I'm not exaggerating when I say everyone in the office wanted to throw up. That's not negotiation, that's textbook extortion.

Our CEO happens to be ex-IT so like... he has ZERO patience. Hears this and just starts screaming "NO DEALS. Lawyer. NOW. Full criminal charges."

They literally lawyered up that same day. Hit him with interference with business operations, violations of the information and communications act, the whole thing. Plus civil damages for lost revenue while the servers were down and every penny spent getting them back online. When they calculated it all out?

Eight figures minimum.

Few days later dumbass shows up at the office with his PARENTS trying to apologize. Parents are crying like "he's young, he made a mistake, please." Our CEO doesn't blink. Just goes "life is a practical learning experience. I'm here to give him a real education." and CLOSES THE DOOR.

So now he's facing criminal charges. His family is getting financially destroyed by the civil suit. This kid literally tried to play 4D chess and accidentally deleted his entire future.

Seriously though don't even THINK about sabotaging company infrastructure when you leave. Everything gets logged. You wreck a server and they WILL find you. I've been pulling all-nighters to fix this mess but honestly seeing that kid's life implode is honestly the most refreshing thing that's happened to me all year.

Life's pay-to-play, baby.