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F.B.I. Arrests Volkswagen Executive on Conspiracy Charges in Emissions Scandal

nytimes.com

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Re: F.B.I. Arrests Volkswagen Executive on Conspiracy Charges in Emissions Scandal

#121

Post by germanier »

bluGill wrote: post #95
gst wrote: post #45

I'm surprised that he decided to stay in the United States. Germany doesn't extradite its own citizens to countries outside the EU (except in very limited cases such as war criminals), so he would have been perfectly safe if he'd moved back to Germany. And even if he would have been sentenced in Germany the sentences handed out in such cases are _much_ more relaxed than the potential sentence he's facing in the Unite…

Germany will extradite in most cases. Here is the treaty if you want to read the fine print http://www.mcnabbassociates.com/Germany%20International%20Ex...

Article 7 clearly states that they are not required to extradite their own citizens and the German constitution actually prohibits extraditing German citizens to outside the EU (Art. 16. Abs. 2).

Re: F.B.I. Arrests Volkswagen Executive on Conspiracy Charges in Emissions Scandal

#122

Post by maverick_iceman »

vkou wrote: post #109
mcguire wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Martha went to prison for securities fraud, not customer facing actions.

Actually, she went to prison for lying to the FBI - which is pretty much impossible to avoid doing if you spend any amount of time talking to them. Don't ever talk to federal investigators. That's your lawyer's job.

Why not plead the fifth?

Re: F.B.I. Arrests Volkswagen Executive on Conspiracy Charges in Emissions Scandal

#123

Post by alistairSH »

JohnGB wrote: post #46

I wonder if the same would have happened to an American company in the USA. If so, what's the deal with the bankers that did orders of magnitude more damage?

I don't recall any arrests related to GM's ignition lock fiasco.

Re: F.B.I. Arrests Volkswagen Executive on Conspiracy Charges in Emissions Scandal

#124

Post by AnimalMuppet »

alistairSH wrote: post #123
JohnGB wrote: post #46

I wonder if the same would have happened to an American company in the USA. If so, what's the deal with the bankers that did orders of magnitude more damage?

I don't recall any arrests related to GM's ignition lock fiasco.

Did GM deliberately try to falsify test results, so as to provide incorrect information to the government?

There's stupidity and incompetence, and then there's deliberately breaking the law and trying to hide that you're doing so. The latter gets you arrested, the former gets you shamed (and perhaps fined).

Re: F.B.I. Arrests Volkswagen Executive on Conspiracy Charges in Emissions Scandal

#125

Post by ensignavenger »

usrusr wrote: post #68
disiplus wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

diesels are popular in europe for one reason that probably somebody from us will not understand. the price of fuel. because the price of fuel is so much bigger fuel efficiency is the biggest concern

In Germany it is not just about the efficiency: diesel fuel is taxed lower per liter than gasoline, for exactly the same stupid reasons personal cars are (were?) often cheaper to register in the USA if you find an excuse to call it a truck.

I was offered to register my escape as a truck or a car in Missouri- but registering it as a truck would have costed more. Apparently had something to do with the max weight loading I could theoretically legally have on it.

Re: F.B.I. Arrests Volkswagen Executive on Conspiracy Charges in Emissions Scandal

#126

Post by mikeash »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #124
alistairSH wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't recall any arrests related to GM's ignition lock fiasco.

Did GM deliberately try to falsify test results, so as to provide incorrect information to the government? There's stupidity and incompetence, and then there's deliberately breaking the law and trying to hide that you're doing so. The latter gets you arrested, the former gets you shamed (and perhaps fined).

Yeah, GM's handling of the ignition switch was bad, but it was organizational (and some individual) incompetence, not conspiracy.

The bad switch was the responsibility of one engineer who simply didn't think it was a problem. Once it turned out it was, the switch was redesigned without changing the part number, which is really weird, but doesn't seem to have been part of any sort of coverup. It then took years for realization of the problem to percolate up far enough for the company as a whole to take action.

Re: F.B.I. Arrests Volkswagen Executive on Conspiracy Charges in Emissions Scandal

#127

Post by mikeash »

maverick_iceman wrote: post #122
vkou wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, she went to prison for lying to the FBI - which is pretty much impossible to avoid doing if you spend any amount of time talking to them. Don't ever talk to federal investigators. That's your lawyer's job.

Why not plead the fifth?

That's absolutely what you should do until you talk to your lawyer and they advise you otherwise.

Re: F.B.I. Arrests Volkswagen Executive on Conspiracy Charges in Emissions Scandal

#128

Post by hx87 »

LordKano wrote: post #67
disiplus wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

diesels are popular in europe for one reason that probably somebody from us will not understand. the price of fuel. because the price of fuel is so much bigger fuel efficiency is the biggest concern

A big part of diesel's fuel efficiency advantage is caused by the emissions controls on gasoline powered vehicles. Vehicles from the early 70s often had similar gas mileage to smaller lighter vehicles from the late 90s-early 2000s but the newer cars had much better emissions. If the makers of gasoline powered cars had cheated like VW did on their diesels, the diesel advantage would have been nonexistent.

> Vehicles from the early 70s often had similar gas mileage to smaller lighter vehicles from the late 90s-early 2000s but the newer cars had much better emissions.

Source? Electronic fuel injection with closed-loop fuel/air control wasn't a mature technology in the 1970s, and open-loop fuel injection (not to mention carburetors) combined with 3- and 4-speed transmissions are inherently less efficient then closed-loop with 4, 5 and 6-speed transmissions.

Re: F.B.I. Arrests Volkswagen Executive on Conspiracy Charges in Emissions Scandal

#129

Post by mikeash »

disiplus wrote: post #42
_nedR wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems to be game over for diesel cars in general, even if you ignore their eventual replacement with electric cars. They have been getting a lot of bad press lately. Their popularity was due to their higher fuel efficiency; But for diesels, it seems that there is trade-off between fuel efficiency and NOx emissions ( http://www.livescience.com/52284-volkswagen-scandal-clean-di... ). With many cities and countries t…

diesels are popular in europe for one reason that probably somebody from us will not understand. the price of fuel. because the price of fuel is so much bigger fuel efficiency is the biggest concern

Not only the price of fuel, but the relative price of the two fuels. In the US, diesel is a fair bit more expensive than regular gasoline, which cuts down or eliminates any cost savings you get from higher efficiency.

Re: F.B.I. Arrests Volkswagen Executive on Conspiracy Charges in Emissions Scandal

#130

Post by hx87 »

_nedR wrote: post #36
dovdovdov wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If this blows up it's over for most german car manufacturers. They sold a lot of diesel cars, and most of them probably have some hacks to meet Euro standards. They should be forced to fix all cars, reimburse buyers for any losses, and be forced(!) to go green asap (which probably means at least 10 years, so yeah there should be some force)!

It seems to be game over for diesel cars in general, even if you ignore their eventual replacement with electric cars. They have been getting a lot of bad press lately. Their popularity was due to their higher fuel efficiency; But for diesels, it seems that there is trade-off between fuel efficiency and NOx emissions ( http://www.livescience.com/52284-volkswagen-scandal-clean-di... ). With many cities and countries t…

> But for diesels, it seems that there is trade-off between fuel efficiency and NOx emissions

Correction: there is a trade-off between fuel efficiency, NOx emissions, particulate emissions, and cost. Urea injection + diesel oxidation catalyst + diesel particulate filters pretty much solves all emissions problems with diesel engines, and that's what GM and Ford diesels do, both in Europe and in the US. It isn't cheap for sure, but the 2014 Chevrolet Cruze diesel is worth every dollar in premium over the gasoline version.

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