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Volkswagen Engineer Pleads Guilty in US Diesel Emissions Probe (fortune.com)

Posted by msmash on from the guilty-as-charged dept.

A Volkswagen AG engineer on Friday pleaded guilty and agreed to cooperate in the Justice Department's probe into the German automaker's diesel emissions scandal -- the first person charged by U.S. authorities in the environmental probe, reports Reuters. From the report:James Liang, who has worked for VW VLKPF since 1983 and was part of a team of engineers who developed a diesel engine, was charged in an indictment made public on Friday with conspiring to commit wire fraud and violating U.S. clean air laws. The 62-year-old engineer from Newbury Park, Calif., appeared in U.S. District Court in Detroit on Friday and entered into a plea agreement that includes his cooperation with the government in its investigation. The indictment says Liang conspired with current and former VW employees to mislead U.S. regulators about the software that allowed the automaker to evade American emissions standards.

14 of 110 comments (clear)

  1. scapegoat much? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    WTF? why does some engineer get thrown under the VW bus?

    1. Re:scapegoat much? by boristdog · · Score: 4, Insightful

      C-level motto: "Always have a patsy on hand."

      I have had management try to make me into a patsy before. Always save your emails. Don't do anything unless you have it in writing.

    2. Re: scapegoat much? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 2

      Prosecutions always start at the bottom. Prosecutors offer plea deals to get subordinates to testify against their bosses, and the first guy to defect gets the best deal. They will work their way up the food chain.

    3. Re:scapegoat much? by ausekilis · · Score: 2

      I learned an old adage some years ago: "Don't fix the problem. Fix the blame."

      This guy is near retirement, will likely only serve a commuted sentence due to age and good behavior, and probably have a nice golden parachute.

    4. Re:scapegoat much? by tnk1 · · Score: 2

      If I was a multimillionaire, 90% of my net income would suck, but I'd still probably be rich or at least upper middle class.

      If this guy got nailed with 90% or even 50% of his net income, he'd lose his house.

      Fines like this cannot just be a percentage, they need to match the circumstances.

    5. Re:scapegoat much? by GuB-42 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Text files that are timestamped and stored on a server, often with multiple copies.
      I don't know how often e-mails are used in court but if you don't have an original signed document, this is probably the next best thing.

    6. Re:scapegoat much? by Rakshasa+Taisab · · Score: 2

      The guy is 62 years old, near retirement.

      Most likely there's been agreements made behind closed doors between VW and US prosecutors; they guy gets some kind of deal that involves him not ever going to jail, he also gets some kind of 'severance/pension' thing for his part in this theater.

      A 'guilty' person has been found, what VW did wrong... or the story they agreed on... is now in the legal system and VW will be made to pay their (pre-arranged) dues. And _EVERYONE_ is now happy and the air will be cleaner.

      --
      - These characters were randomly selected.
  2. Indictments please climb the corp. ladder by Tesen · · Score: 2

    Hopefully there is paperwork to show management had a hand in this; this kind of culture needs to stop. Mr. Engineer, wink... bonus...wink... standards... wink.

  3. How many counts? by jaymemaurice · · Score: 4, Insightful

    So if he is responsible for the creation "defeat device", is he responsible for the installation on every vehicle sold in the US?

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    120 characters ought to be enough for anyone
  4. Hooray for scapegoats by ErichTheRed · · Score: 2

    I wonder what's actually happening here. No one in a high-profile civil case pleads guilty unless they have a real reason to. Is VW paying his family an exorbitant sum of money through a back-channel?

    There's no way an engineer comes up with a scheme like this on their own. I know for myself that I'd be too much of an honest guy to go along with that. Yes, I know that makes me an idiot. But management is always involved in things like this, or at the very least is willfully blind. German companies are very meticulous, so I'm sure they have the exact email, timestamped to the millisecond, showing the management team telling the engineers to put the defeat device in.

  5. That was Wells Fargo... by Ellis+D.+Tripp · · Score: 2

    http://www.npr.org/2016/09/09/...

    With all the corporate crime going on, it is easy to get your scumbags mixed up....

    --
    Remember "News for Nerds, Stuff that Matters"? Help make it a reality again! http://soylentnews.org
  6. Re: VW Engineer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    Meanwhile, the methane leak in Los Angeles last year caused more pollution than all of the affected VW's could ever hope to create in their lifespan.

  7. So what? by argStyopa · · Score: 2

    ...I'll believe someone's getting punished when SENIOR MANAGEMENT is seeing jail time or fines in excess of several years' pay.

    Hauling one nearly-retired engineer up in the dock doesn't mean shit.

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    -Styopa
  8. Always starts at the bottom by sjbe · · Score: 4, Insightful

    WTF? why does some engineer get thrown under the VW bus?

    Because they are the easiest to get to. Hopefully they'll work their way up the ladder. It's almost always hardest to get to the guys at the top and you usually have to start at the bottom and work up. He'll probably get a lighter sentence in exchange for giving up a bigger fish and then the bigger fish will get a deal to give up the next guy up the food chain. Eventually you get to the top but it takes a while and a lot of work.