A wild story is coming out of Auburn this week with the arrest of a former recruiting staffer on charges of theft of trade secrets and computer tampering.

According to a report from Justin Hokanson of Auburn On3, David Rudolph Jenrath, 24, of Franklin, Tennessee — a former member of Hugh Freeze’s staff — was arrested under allegations that sensitive football and recruiting evaluation information had been stolen and distributed to competitors.

Hokanson reports that Jenrath, who had been allowed to stay under the Alex Golesh staff in a student-assistant role after Freeze’s firing, was dismissed by the program back in June. Jenrath was allegedly seen in the student section during the baseball Super Regional on campus after telling Auburn staff that he was out sick that day – and as a result, he was fired.

A little over a month later, an anonymous email was sent to football personnel at approximately 11 other schools under the name “Don Julio” and included documents containing recruiting evaluations and information on coaches’ thoughts about certain players for Auburn’s 2027, 2028 and 2029 recruiting classes. The subject line of the email was Golesh’s home address.

Reportedly, several of the schools who received the material forwarded it back to Auburn, leading the staff to report the information to the Auburn Police Department, who tracked the email address back to Jenrath.

Jenrath recently made an Instagram post where he claimed to have connections to people at Vanderbilt and Tennessee, and even said he provided information to them, which feels significant as Auburn prepares to face the Volunteers this week.

Notably, Hokanson reported that the information Jenrath allegedly provided to other schools did not contain Auburn’s playbook or any NIL-related  information, which would give schools a competitive advantage over them.

However, Hokanson’s sources revealed that Auburn personnel believes the coaches’ evaluations and internal assessments qualify as trade secrets, which led to there being a criminal complaint.

Once Jenrath was identified as the suspect and warrants were obtained for his arrest, Jenrath later turned himself into the Auburn Police Department on Monday, September 28, 2026, and was transported to the Lee County Jail, where he is being held on a $15,000 bond.