I always thought there was a tremendous irony in Germany’s far left heavily protesting Tesla for Elon’s speech while their own corporate giant committed widespread emissions fraud for years
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German court sends VW execs to prison over Dieselgate scandal
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Re: German court sends VW execs to prison over Dieselgate scandal
#12The OP does not mention the name of one VW exec (Oliver Schmidt, the head of VW's environmental and engineering office in Michigan, a German citizen) convicted in US Federal Court in 2017 for his part in the scandal. He was released after serving about 3.5 years in prison.
A second exec sentenced in the US (also in 2017) was James Liang, also a German citizen, who prosecutors say "was a pivotal figure in designing the systems used to make Volkswagen diesels appear to comply with U.S. pollution standards, when instead they could emit up to 40 times the allowed levels of smog-forming compounds in normal driving." He cooperated with prosecutors and was released from prison in 2019.
I vaguely remember that the top execs were charged by US (Federal) prosecutors (in 2017) but the German government refused to extradict. Schmidt was arrested and tried only because he made the mistake of traveling to the US after the scandal came to light (although of course the German Court might have gotten around to trying him like they tried the execs in this current news story).
Re: German court sends VW execs to prison over Dieselgate scandal
#13I always thought there was a tremendous irony in Germany’s far left heavily protesting Tesla for Elon’s speech while their own corporate giant committed widespread emissions fraud for years
Why is this irony? One is being done out in the open and the other was unknown for years, so unless "the far left" knew about the defeat devices, this is a false dichotomy.
Re: German court sends VW execs to prison over Dieselgate scandal
#14I always thought there was a tremendous irony in Germany’s far left heavily protesting Tesla for Elon’s speech while their own corporate giant committed widespread emissions fraud for years
The Scandal was big in Germany and contrary to complaints about Musk there was quite a lot legal action against VW (while law has some restrictions preventing huge damage claims as in the US) so I don't really understand the comparison.
Re: German court sends VW execs to prison over Dieselgate scandal
#15Next, bring back hanging for corporate manslaughter.
Re: German court sends VW execs to prison over Dieselgate scandal
#16I always thought there was a tremendous irony in Germany’s far left heavily protesting Tesla for Elon’s speech while their own corporate giant committed widespread emissions fraud for years
Why is this irony? One is being done out in the open and the other was unknown for years, so unless "the far left" knew about the defeat devices, this is a false dichotomy.
Its a false dichotomy either way because VW and the handling of the administration back then was heavily criticized by many parties, including left leaning parties like the greens
Re: German court sends VW execs to prison over Dieselgate scandal
#17The OP does not mention the name of one VW exec (Oliver Schmidt, the head of VW's environmental and engineering office in Michigan, a German citizen) convicted in US Federal Court in 2017 for his part in the scandal. He was released after serving about 3.5 years in prison. A second exec sentenced in the US (also in 2017) was James Liang, also a German citizen, who prosecutors say "was a pivotal figure in designing th…
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Re: German court sends VW execs to prison over Dieselgate scandal
#18[flagged]
> You see USA? This is how it's done.
You mean like Oliver Schmidt, the VW exec that the USA sentenced to 7 years in federal prison all the way back in 2017 for his part in this scandal? Who was then sent back to Germany in the middle of his sentence and pretty much immediately released on parole by German authorities?
But sure, USA bad or whatever.
Re: German court sends VW execs to prison over Dieselgate scandal
#19What about major shareholders?
Presumably they were blissfully unaware, and were simply pleased when VW delivered more profits, as demanded.
Re: German court sends VW execs to prison over Dieselgate scandal
#20And one engineer went on vacation to America. Congratulations, you‘ve won seven years in a foreign prison! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver_Schmidt_(engineer)
It's the other way around, he was US-based and went for a vacation to Germany.