After a week of ribbing about the character of the founder of one of its portfolio companies, Bessemer Venture Partners general partner David Cowan responded by providing a fuller picture.

LifeLock, an identity theft prevention startup that has raised $13 million from Bessemer and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, was founded by Robert Maynard and launched in 2005. The Phoenix New Times wrote a story last week noting that Maynard had faced some criminal problems prior to the establishment of LifeLock. Others in the media extrapolated that LifeLock's venture investors had been bamboozled.

Cowan refutes that. TechCrunch goes further in a revealing post about how The Phoenix New Times may have come up with much of the material for their story. While LifeLock angel investor Howard Lindzon takes exception to the TechCrunch post, and Alarm:clock suggests TechCrunch should have done more to connect the dots, both posts are useful.

And while it looks like the venture capitalists did their due diligence on the background of the company principals in this case, it's just another reminder that very bad things can happen when they don't.

For more on LifeLock, see:
David Cowan
TechCrunch
Valleywag

Tags: lifelock, bessemer, kpcb, vc, venture+capital