As the co-worker who ran smack into this problem, I think the question that I would really like to find out is:
So, which is the more common result?
I can see both of these being solutions to that equation:
x = q * d + r
-7 = 4 * d + r
So for d = -1, r = -3
And for d = -2, r = 1
In the code I'm writing I have use for both of these results, so neither is more or less correct. I just thought that there was a commonly accepted algorithm (as there is for positive modulo) for this.
I think it really comes down to how the rounding operation works.