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I swiped my key card at the entrance. Red light. Access denied.
Tried again. Same result. Red light denied.
I’d had to get mine reissued twice in four years. So I called Jordan. Straight to voicemail.
I tried the office phone. Vanessa, our office manager, picked up after three rings. Her voice was weird.
Quiet, tight. “Hey, Vanessa, my key card’s not working. Can you buzz me in?”
Long pause.
I could hear her breathing. “Cameron, I can’t. Jordan told me not to let you in.”
My brain stuttered.
“What?”
“He sent an email to everyone last night. Said you’re no longer with the company. He said if you showed up, I should call building security.
And I hung up. Stood there in the parking lot at 7:17 a.m.
Phone in my hand, staring at the building I’d helped lease, the company I’d built. Six years gone, locked out like some temp who stole office supplies. My phone buzzed.
Texts coming in from consultants. Rachel first. “Cameron, what’s going on?
Got an email from Jordan saying you’re out.”
Then Daniel. “Is this real? Are you okay?”
Karen.
“Call me when you can. This is insane.”
Then it clicked. The closed-door meetings, the solo client calls, the systematic exclusion. He’d been building support, getting consultants on his side, or at least keeping them neutral, setting up the infrastructure to push me out.
Jordan finally called me back at 9:47 a.m. Two and a half hours after I’d been locked out. I was sitting in my truck in a diner parking lot drinking burned coffee and reviewing our operating agreement on my laptop.
His voice was cheerful, friendly even, like we were buddies catching up. “Cameron, hey, sorry about the confusion this morning.”
“Confusion? You locked me out of my own company.”
“Our company?
Past tense. I’m buying you out.”
“Based on what authority?”
“Based on the emergency board resolution we passed last night. You’re removed as managing partner, effective immediately.
You’ll receive a buyout offer by end of week.”
I felt my blood pressure spike. My hands were shaking. Not from fear, from pure rage.
“There is no board, Jordan. It’s just us, two partners, 50/50 split.”
“Actually, if you check the operating agreement, Section 7.3, in cases of partner misconduct, the non-offending partner can assume temporary control pending resolution. I’m exercising that clause.”
I pulled up the operating agreement.
Section 7.3 did exist, but it required documented misconduct and formal notification, neither of which Jordan had provided. “What misconduct?”
“Mismanagement of client accounts, unauthorized expense approvals, failure to meet fiduciary duties, negligent oversight that put company assets at risk. I’ve got documentation.
Client complaints about your communication. Project overruns you failed to flag. Safety violations at facilities under your supervision.”
My jaw clenched.
Total fabrication. Every single claim. But Jordan had been building a paper trail.
Fake complaints. Manufactured problems. Creating evidence that didn’t exist to justify my removal.
“You’re lying.”
“I have three separate client emails expressing concerns about your project management. That’s a pattern of misconduct, Cameron. I can’t risk the company’s reputation because you’re burning out and making mistakes.”
“Show me the emails.”
“They’ll be included in the discovery process when we formalize your termination.
Right now, you need to decide whether you want to make this easy or difficult.”
“You can’t terminate a 50/50 partner.”
“I can when that partner is actively harming the business. Section 7.3 is clear.”
“And before you think about lawyering up, let me save you some time. We’ll see you in court in about 18 months after you burn through $80,000 in legal fees trying to prove I’m wrong.
Or you can take the buyout, $340,000 for your share, and walk away clean. No litigation, no drama. Just sign the papers and move on.”
The number landed like a punch.
$340,000. Our company was worth at least $3.5 million based on annual revenue and client contracts. Conservative valuation.
He was offering me less than ten cents on the dollar. “That’s theft.”
“That’s business, Cameron. You’re good at operations, but you clearly don’t understand the big picture.
Take the offer or don’t. Either way, you’re out.”
He hung up. I sat in my truck for an hour, shaking.
Not from fear, from rage. Pure concentrated rage. Six years.
Six years of building something, and this clown thought he could just take it. Here’s the thing about being calm and calculated. People mistake it for weakness.
Jordan thought I’d fold. Thought I’d take his lowball offer because fighting would cost too much. He was banking on me being too broke or too tired to challenge him.
He was wrong. I drove to a coffee shop, opened my laptop, and started pulling every file I had. Contracts, financial records, email chains.
I’d been meticulous about documentation. Every client interaction, every project scope, every invoice saved and backed up. Jordan had access to the company server, but he didn’t know I’d been keeping secondary backups on my personal drives since day one.
Old habit from a previous job where the owner tried to screw me on commission. Learned my lesson then. Always keep your own records.
By noon, I had everything organized. Client lists, revenue breakdowns, project histories. Then I started going through Jordan’s files.
The guy was sloppy. He’d been routing company money to his personal accounts for months, but he’d also been running the business like an amateur. That’s when I noticed the software.
We ran enterprise level project management software. ProBuild Systems, industry standard for consulting operations. License cost was $8,900 per year.
For our tier, we had 12 consultants plus two partners plus Vanessa, 15 people total. Should have been 15 seats minimum. Total annual cost around $133,500.
I pulled up our software expense records for fiscal year 2023. Total ProBuild costs: $8,900. Just one license payment.
That didn’t add up. I opened ProBuild on my personal laptop. I still had access through my login credentials and navigated to the admin portal.
Checked the user management dashboard. 15 active users, all showing as authenticated, all showing as properly licensed according to the system. But we’d only paid for one seat.
I pulled up our shared drive and found the licensing folder. One single license file dated March 12th, 2019. Purchase receipt attached showing $8,900 paid to ProBuild Systems for one enterprise seat.
Nothing after that. No renewal receipts. No additional seat purchases.
Just that initial license from five years ago. Jordan had cracked it, pirated the enterprise version, and deployed it companywide. Saved himself over $100,000 per year in licensing fees while using illegal software on every project, every client file, every single piece of documentation we’d ever produced.
I sat there staring at my laptop screen in that coffee shop, and I swear I felt something click into place. The anger transformed into something colder, more focused. Jordan wanted to play dirty.
Fine, let’s see exactly how dirty we could get. The Business Software Alliance, BSA, handles software piracy enforcement in the US. Trade group representing major software companies.
Microsoft, Adobe, Autodesk, Oracle, and yeah, ProBuild Systems. Their entire purpose is finding companies using pirated software and hitting them with massive fines to protect their members’ revenue streams. They don’t mess around.
If you’re running pirated enterprise software, they will investigate, audit, and hit you with fines that make IRS penalties look like parking tickets. I’d heard about them during a conference panel years ago. Some guy talked about how his competitor got nailed for using pirated CAD software.
Fines hit $780,000. Company went under within months. Jordan had just handed me a nuclear option.
I spent the next three hours documenting everything. Every single piece of evidence I could find. Screenshots first.
I captured our ProBuild admin portal showing 15 active users. Each screenshot timestamped showing the deployment status, last login dates, active sessions. Then I photographed the licensing folder on our shared drive.
One single license file dated March 12th, 2019. Purchase receipt attached showing $8,900 paid to ProBuild Systems. Nothing after that.
No renewals, no additional seat purchases, just that one initial license. Then I pulled email chains. Jordan to Harvey, our IT contractor, April 2019.
“Need ProBuild running on all consultant workstations by Monday. Budget’s tight and I don’t want to pay per seat licensing if we can avoid it.”
Harvey’s response:
“I can deploy from the single license, but that’s technically violation of their TOS. Each user needs their own seat.
You sure you want to do this?”
Jordan’s reply:
“Harvey, I’m not paying $100,000 for software when one license works fine. Just make it happen. Nobody audits this stuff.”
Anyway, that email alone was gold.
Proof of intent. Proof Jordan knew exactly what he was doing and did it anyway. I found more.
Jordan to me, September 2020 when I’d asked about software expenses. “Got a sweetheart deal with ProBuild through a contact. Don’t worry about it.”
Translation: we’re running pirated software and I’m lying to your face.
Email to our accounting firm, March 2021. “ProBuild licensing is handled through a special enterprise agreement. Annual cost is $8,900 total.”
Lie.
Complete fabrication. I pulled deployment logs from our server. Every installation documented.
Computer names, installation dates, user assignments. 15 separate installations between April 2019 and May 2024. Each one technically required its own $8,900 annual license.
None of them had one. Then I documented the client contracts. Every single one included language about us using properly licensed industry standard software tools to ensure work product integrity.
We’d been promising clients legitimate operations while running cracked software. That created massive liability. ProBuild’s terms of service, which I also downloaded and saved, explicitly stated that work product created using unlicensed software could be considered legally compromised.
Meaning every analysis we delivered, every efficiency report, every process optimization document we’d produced could potentially be challenged as invalid. Jordan had exposed the company to catastrophic legal risk to save a hundred grand per year. I organized everything into a folder structure.
Screenshots in one subfolder, emails in another, deployment logs in a third, client contracts in a fourth, ProBuild’s TOS and licensing terms in a fifth. Created a master document summarizing everything. Timeline of violations, financial impact, proof of intent, client liability exposure.
47 pages. When I finished, airtight case. No room for Jordan to weasel out.
Then I went to the BSA website, Business Software Alliance. Their entire mission statement was right there on the homepage. Protecting software innovation and intellectual property rights through compliance enforcement and legal action against software piracy.
They had a dedicated reporting portal. Big red button, report software piracy. I clicked it.
The form was detailed. They wanted specifics. Company name, physical address, software products in question, evidence of piracy, contact information for follow-up.
I filled it out methodically. Company name, Pinnacle Operations Group, LLC. Address, our office location.
Software, ProBuild Systems Enterprise Edition. Evidence, comprehensive documentation attached. The form asked for my relationship to the company.
Options included current employee, former employee, competitor, client, anonymous tipster. I selected anonymous tipster. Didn’t need them knowing I was a partner.
Better if this looked like it came from an outside source. They had a text box for narrative explanation. 5,000 character limit.
I used every character. Explained how Pinnacle Operations Group purchased one enterprise seat of ProBuild Systems in March 2019 for $8,900. Explained how that license was never renewed.
No additional seats purchased despite the company deploying the software across 15 workstations for five consecutive years. Explained the emails proving intent. How Jordan explicitly instructed IT to deploy beyond licensing limits to avoid paying proper fees.
Explained the client contracts promising licensed software. Explained the liability exposure. Calculated the theft.
$8,900 per seat, 15 seats, 5 years. Total $667,500 in unpaid licensing fees. Added that ProBuild’s enterprise agreement explicitly prohibited the type of deployment we were running.
Attached every document. Screenshots, emails, deployment logs, client contracts. ProBuild’s terms of service with relevant sections highlighted.
The form had a confidentiality checkbox. Do you wish to remain anonymous? I checked yes.
Added a note. Reporter wishes to remain confidential due to potential retaliation. All evidence provided is factual and verifiable.
Reviewed everything one final time. Made sure every document was legible. Every date was correct.
Every claim was supported by evidence. Then I hit submit at exactly 4:37 p.m. on June 4th, 2024.
Confirmation page loaded. Thank you for your report. The Business Software Alliance takes software piracy seriously and investigates all credible reports.
A case manager will review your submission within 48 to 72 hours. If additional information is needed, we will contact you using the information provided. All reports are handled with strict confidentiality.
Case number generated: BSA 2022-06-8743. I screenshot that, too. Saved it.
Closed my laptop. Done. I didn’t tell anyone.
Didn’t post on social media. Didn’t vent to friends. Just filed the report and waited.
The BSA doesn’t mess around, but they also don’t move instantly. I figured I’d have a week, maybe two, before anything happened. I spent that time organizing my defense for the inevitable legal fight over the buyout.
I contacted three lawyers, explained the situation, got quotes. Expensive like Jordan predicted, but doable if I sold my truck and tapped savings. Then I got a text from one of my consultants, Rachel, senior operations analyst, worked with me for four years.
She’d been quiet since Jordan’s lockout email, probably scared of getting fired. Her text came through on June 6th, two days after I filed the report. “Cameron, something weird is happening at the office.
Men in suits showed up this morning with badges. Jordan’s freaking out.”
I texted back. “What kind of badges?”
“Federal.
They’re auditing our computers. All of them. Jordan’s in his office with lawyers.
Vanessa said it’s about software.”
I didn’t respond. Just sat there feeling something I hadn’t felt in weeks. Satisfaction.
The BSA moved fast. Probably because my report was airtight. When you hand them documented evidence of enterprise level piracy, they don’t need to investigate much.
They just show up, audit everything, and start calculating fines. Rachel kept me updated over the next 24 hours. The federal auditors spent six hours in the office on June 6th.
Not regular consultants. These were BSA enforcement specialists backed by federal authority. They had legal right to audit any computer system suspected of software piracy.
They imaged every computer, took exact digital copies of every hard drive, pulled server logs going back five years, interviewed staff individually, asked who installed the software, who authorized it, who knew about the licensing situation. Rachel said Vanessa broke down crying when they questioned her. Said she didn’t know anything about licensing.
She just used the software Jordan told her to use. Daniel and Karen gave similar statements. They were consultants.
They used whatever tools the company provided. Nobody below partner level had access to licensing information. Jordan tried multiple strategies.
First, he played dumb. Claimed he didn’t know the software wasn’t properly licensed. Said he’d delegated IT management to contractors and assumed everything was handled correctly.
The auditors pulled up his emails, the ones I’d submitted in my report, and that defense collapsed immediately. Then he tried to blame the IT contractor, said Harvey must have installed the software improperly without authorization. The auditors asked for Harvey’s contact information.
Jordan suddenly couldn’t provide it. Convenient. Then he tried blaming me, said I’d been managing operations and IT oversight fell under my responsibilities.
The auditors checked the company structure, asked who had signatory authority on software purchases. Jordan’s name. Asked who communicated with IT contractors about deployment.
Jordan’s email. Asked who made the decision to use one license across multiple installations. Jordan couldn’t deflect anymore.
The auditors found everything, not just the ProBuild Systems violations. They also discovered we were running unlicensed copies of Microsoft Office on three computers, another $1,200 in violations. And our accounting software, QuickBooks Enterprise, was licensed for three users, but deployed on five computers, another $2,400 in violations.
Jordan had been cutting corners on every piece of software we used. Thought he was being smart, thought nobody would notice or care. The auditors noticed, they cared, and they documented everything with forensic precision.
The fines came down on June 7th, exactly 48 hours after I filed the report. $947,000. Let me break that down.
ProBuild Systems charged $8,900 per seat annually. We’d been running 15 seats illegally for five years. That’s $667,500 in stolen licensing fees.
Then you add statutory damages, triple the amount under federal anti-piracy law, and suddenly you’re at $2 million. The BSA and ProBuild generously settled for $947,000 payable within 30 days. Jordan tried to negotiate, tried to claim financial hardship, set up payment plans, anything to avoid the full hit.
But BSA doesn’t negotiate. You pay or they seize assets and pursue criminal charges. Pinnacle Operations Group had $310,000 in liquid assets.
The rest was tied up in equipment, receivables, and operational costs. Even if Jordan liquidated everything, he’d maybe hit $600,000. He was $350,000 short.
And that’s before accounting for ongoing business expenses, payroll, and client obligations. He was cooked. Rachel texted me again on June 9th.
“Jordan just fired everyone. Effective immediately. Says the company’s insolvent.
We’re all scrambling for new jobs. This is insane.”
I texted back. “Sorry you’re caught in this.
Let me know if you need a reference.”
She responded an hour later. “You knew, didn’t you?”
I didn’t reply. By June 11th, Pinnacle Operations Group was done.
Jordan filed for bankruptcy protection, but it didn’t matter. The BSA fines were non-dischargeable. He’d be paying them off personally for the next decade.
Clients started pulling contracts immediately. Word spread fast in the industry. Nobody wants to work with a company that’s under federal investigation for software piracy.
Liability nightmare. Jordan tried calling me on June 12th. I let it go to voicemail.
He called again and again. Finally left a message. Voice cracking.
“Cameron, we need to talk. This is… this is insane. I don’t know who reported us, but the fines are killing the company.
We need to figure this out together. Call me back.”
I deleted the message. He tried email next.
Long, rambling paragraphs about how we could work through this and rebuild together, how the buyout offer was still on the table if I helped him restructure and deal with the BSA situation. I didn’t respond. The final email came on June 15th.
“You did this, didn’t you? You reported us. You sabotaged the company because you couldn’t handle being pushed out.
You’re pathetic, Cameron. You’d rather destroy everything than let me run the business.”
I smiled, cracked my knuckles, and wrote back. Only response I sent the entire time.
“Jordan, I didn’t destroy anything. You built a company on stolen software, embezzled funds, and locked out the partner who actually did the work. The BSA just presented the bill.
Maybe next time don’t tell someone they can’t afford a lawyer while you’re actively committing federal crimes.”
“Enjoy bankruptcy,”
“Cameron.”
I hit send and blocked his email. The fallout was beautiful in its efficiency. Pinnacle Operations Group officially dissolved on June 28th.
Assets liquidated, clients scattered, consultants found new jobs. Jordan’s BMW got repossessed, his house went up for sale, his wife filed for separation in July. Turns out she didn’t appreciate being dragged into his financial crater.
And me? I spent two weeks reaching out to our former clients. Explained the situation delicately.
Partner dispute, company dissolved, but I was still available for consulting work. Most of them remembered me as the guy who actually fixed their problems, while Jordan glad-handed executives. By mid-July, I had six active contracts.
By August, I’d hired three of our old consultants, Rachel included, and filed LLC papers for a new firm. Clean slate, no partner, full control. Revenue hit $340,000 in the first quarter.
We’re on track for $1.6 million by year end. Not bad for a guy who supposedly couldn’t afford a lawyer. Jordan, last I heard, is working sales for an industrial supply company.
Entry level, still paying off the BSA fines. His LinkedIn profile is private now. Six months after the company dissolved, I ran into him at a gas station.
Pure coincidence. He was pumping regular into a 10-year-old sedan. I was filling up my new truck, paid cash.
He saw me. Looked like he wanted to walk away, but his tank was half empty. I nodded, kept filling my truck.
“Cameron,” his voice was flat. “Jordan. Business going well?
Hit $1.8 million this year, projected $2.4 million next year.”
He didn’t respond. Just stared at the pump numbers climbing. “That offer still stands if you need a reference,” I said.
“For job applications.”
He looked at me. “You destroyed everything.”
“You built it on stolen software and embezzled funds. I just made a phone call.”
The pump clicked off.
He replaced the nozzle, got in his car, and drove away without another word. Haven’t seen him since. Update because people keep asking.
Yeah, I knew about the pirated software before Jordan locked me out. Noticed it about a year into our partnership when I was reviewing IT expenses. Brought it up to Jordan once.
He said he negotiated a special deal with ProBuild. I dropped it and focused on client work. Once he locked me out and tried to pay me $340,000 for a company worth $3.5 million, that information became relevant real fast.
The consultants who got laid off, I helped all of them find new positions within two weeks. Rachel, Daniel, and Karen work for me now. The others got placed with former clients or competitors.
Everyone landed on their feet except Jordan. Three of our former clients actually called me the day after the bankruptcy filing. They’d already heard what happened through industry channels.
All three signed contracts with my new firm within a week. Jordan’s lockout plan backfired. Instead of keeping the clients, he lost them all to me.
His wife, Andrea, filed for separation in July. The shell company payments came out during the BSA investigation. Turned out she didn’t know Jordan was funneling company money through her LLC.
When the divorce papers hit, she included a fraud claim. Last I heard, she’s getting the house and most of their assets. Jordan’s parents called me in August.
His dad left a voicemail asking if there was any way to work this out and if I’d be willing to help Jordan get back on his feet. I didn’t call back. Final update.
Got a message from Jordan’s lawyer last week threatening to sue me for tortious interference and defamation. Apparently, Jordan thinks he can salvage his reputation by claiming I sabotaged him. I forwarded the email to my lawyer.
She reviewed it for about 10 minutes, then called me back. “This is a bluff. Everything you reported to the BSA was documented fact.
Truth is an absolute defense against defamation, and you can’t interfere with someone’s business by reporting their federal crimes. That’s not how the law works.”
She drafted a response. “Your client committed multiple federal violations documented through his own emails and company records.
Our client reported those violations through proper legal channels. If you proceed with this lawsuit, we will countersue for malicious prosecution and abuse of process. We will also subpoena all financial records related to your client’s embezzlement and shell company payments.
We estimate your client’s additional exposure at $400,000+ in civil penalties. Proceed at your own risk.”
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