Former Volkswagen CEO Martin Winterkorn has been charged in federal court in Detroit with conspiring to mislead regulators about the German automaker’s “cheating” Uncle’s emissions tests.
Winterkorn, 70, was listed for the first time with five other German Volkswagen executives originally charged in 2016.
The indictment, filed in March under seal, was unsealed Thursday in U.S. District Court. In court filings, U.S. Attorney Matthew Schneider says the indictment was unsealed “because there is no longer a belief that unsealing these documents will compromise an ongoing investigation.”
The indictment alleges that Winterkorn specifically approved the efforts to mislead regulators. The Horror!
He has been charged with heavy-sounding “conspiracy” and “wire fraud.” In fact, his guilt is of the same species as that of the driver who uses a radar detector to “cheat” a speed trap.
U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions let loose with the warble of Uncle outraged:
“If you try to deceive the United States, then you will pay a heavy price,” he said.
Two former VW engineers, Oliver Schmidt, 48, and James Liang, 63, both German citizens, pleaded guilty last year to participating in the “conspiracy” and are serving multi-year prison sentences.
Five additional defendants were indicted in January 2017, but have not been arrested and are free in Germany, where they can escape extradition to the United States as German citizens under the German Constitution. One other defendant, Giovanni Pamio, 61, an Italian citizen and former manager at Audi AG, has been charged and currently remains in Germany pending extradition, U.S. Department of Justice officials said.
In the indictment unsealed on Thursday, Winterkorn is alleged to have been informed in May 2014 and July 2015 of the efforts to cheat emissions tests in the United States. It further alleges that Winterkorn, armed with that knowledge, “agreed with other senior VW executives to continue to perpetrate the fraud and deceive U.S. regulators,” the Department of Justice (sic) said.
The indictment alleges that, at that meeting, Winterkorn did not order his subordinates, including Schmidt, to disclose the cheating, but instead agreed to continue to attempt to deceive regulators.
On Sept. 3, 2015, VW officially admitted that it had installed defeat devices in various 2.0-liter diesel vehicles sold in the United States. The company pleaded guilty to three felonies in March 2017 and agreed to pay $4.3 billion in penalties.
The American Schutzstaffel finally caught up to the culprit.
Just another witch hunt/Gypsy hunt. Throw the bum into an Iron Maiden for starters. Then over to the dunking pole, teach him that cheaters always lose.
Greenpeace stole the keys to 1000 VWs ready for export. That’s what you get when you cheat.
Frederick William I decrees that any Gypsy (Roma) caught in his territory, man or woman, will be hanged without trial. A reward is offered.
The year: 1734. metis-history dot info has the info.
And those other bums involved over in Germany who are on the lam need to be hunted down like dogs.
Anybody manufacturing anhydrous ammonia should be charged with misuse/theft of atmospheric nitrogen.
It should be illegal to use natural gas to manufacture fertilizer that virtually guarantees seed germination in commercial ag crops. Farmers need to be imprisoned for using anhydrous ammonia.
The Haber-Bosch process needs to be banned.
Might as well go all hyperbolic.
Hi Eric and all,
Is this the broohaha about VW you refer to? Netflix
https://www.netflix.com/watch/80149533?trackId=155573558
Hi Frank,
I’m note sure! The link just takes me to a Netflix sign up page…
I read about something that happened just like this in New England about 300 years ago….now what was it called?
The Horrors indeed. Ol Jeff is right. They’ll hound this ol boy to his dying day.
Hell,they’ll hound me further that. I have a plot paid for the wife and I but we’ve decided to deny them even in the beyond.
You can be straight up and commit some crime such as organizing anti war marches and be hounded for decades….and beyond….so to speak.
So we choose to be turned to ash should they be able to find a body(I sure hope not). Our families are tasked with spreading those ashes privately should a body be found.
No matter what happens though, I have a file that will live on in infamy….or famously, depending on your view.
Should something so ridiculous as a Christian “hell” exist, you can rest assured I’ll be, hopefully, along with Martin, torturing J. Edgar, along with every politician and bureaucrat and cop for all eternity…and as Philip Hoffman says in Pirate Radio, “for a couple days more”. FEAFEFH’s