Slashdot Mirror
Volkswagen Executive Sentenced To Maximum Prison Term For His Role In Dieselgate (arstechnica.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: On Wednesday, a U.S. District judge in Detroit sentenced Oliver Schmidt, a former Volkswagen executive, to seven years in prison for his role in the Volkswagen diesel emissions scandal of 2015. Schmidt was also ordered to pay a criminal penalty of $400,000, according to a U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) press release. The prison term and the fine together represent the maximum sentence that Schmidt could have received under the plea deal he signed in August. Schmidt, a German citizen who lived in Detroit as an emissions compliance executive for VW, was arrested in Miami on vacation last January. In August, he pleaded guilty to conspiracy and to making a false statement under the Clean Air Act. Schmidt's plea deal stated that the former executive could face up to seven years in prison and between $40,000 and $400,000 in fines.
Last week, Schmidt's attorneys made a last-minute bid requesting a lighter sentence for Schmidt: 40 months of supervised release and a $100,000 fine. Schmidt also wrote a letter to the judge, which surfaced over the weekend, in which the executive said he felt "misused" by his own company and claimed that higher-ranked VW executives coached him on a script to help him lie to a California Air Resources Board (CARB) official. Instead, Schmidt was sentenced to the maximum penalties outlined in the plea deal. Only one other VW employee has been sentenced in connection with the emissions scandal: former engineer James Liang, who received 40 months in prison and two years of supervised release as the result of his plea deal. Although six other VW Group executives have been indicted, none is in U.S. custody.
Last week, Schmidt's attorneys made a last-minute bid requesting a lighter sentence for Schmidt: 40 months of supervised release and a $100,000 fine. Schmidt also wrote a letter to the judge, which surfaced over the weekend, in which the executive said he felt "misused" by his own company and claimed that higher-ranked VW executives coached him on a script to help him lie to a California Air Resources Board (CARB) official. Instead, Schmidt was sentenced to the maximum penalties outlined in the plea deal. Only one other VW employee has been sentenced in connection with the emissions scandal: former engineer James Liang, who received 40 months in prison and two years of supervised release as the result of his plea deal. Although six other VW Group executives have been indicted, none is in U.S. custody.
Yea, the guys at the top know better than to get caught. What happens is the CYA chain ends some point below them and the hapless subordinate gets left holding the bag because he sacrificed his ethics to meet his employer's demands and didn't think though things far enough to realize he'd be holding the bag.
The moral of the story is to ALWAYS act ethically and legally and never demand your subordinates do anything less either. If your management team requests that you do anything else, demand a written order before complying and keep the original signed copy in a safe place. If they demand you order your subordinates to violate this rule, make them give the order themselves...
On another note, if you find yourself collecting CYA documents, you might brush off that Resume and get out of dodge. You don't want to work for unethical people very long because they may be setting you up as the scapegoat. Don't give them a chance.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Germany, and by extension Europe, has over the last decades tried very hard to project an image of a decent, honest, open, rule-bound democracy with integrity, good laws, yada yada yada. Listening to the Germans and Europeans in general, you'd think that its always the U.S. Corporations that are doing horrible things in the name of profit. This has been used very, very successfully to mask the fact that German and other powerful European companies are incredibly aggressive when it comes to making money/profit, especially in developing world markets where they are very strong, and there are no rules for them to play by. Its not just German companies either. The French, Belgians, Dutch and so forth aren't any better. If there is money to be grabbed, they'll grab it, decency and rules be damned. So its not just VW and the other automakers that are doing this sort of stuff. This is a system problem in a European Union that seems "super decent" image-wise, but is anything but in reality. Also, there is no way the German and other European governments didn't know this kind of cheating was happening. They knew, but turned a blind eye to it until there was no hiding it anymore.
Why did the chicken cross the road? Because Elon Musk put an AI chip in its head.
How much environmental damage did this cause? Quantify it. If you're going to assert that he should be killed for his crime, you should be able to identify exactly what his crime was.
This seems like a silly argument. Sort of like telling the traffic court judge that you didn't kill anyone or cause any property damage, so the running the red light ticket should be dismissed. And asking for quantification of the damage? How many significant digits would you require?
The US government isn't the bad guy here. It's mostly on the Volkswagen top executives that asked the scapegoats to lie to protect the higher-ups. Note that the lying was never intended to protect the company but only the executives. It's also somewhat on the scapegoats who agreed to lie even though it was disingenuous of them to believe that they had anything positive to gain by breaking the law.
A co-worker of mine used to be in senior management at VW DE (left more than a decade ago), and he said that the whole thing was utterly unsurprising to him. He said the US management was the worst cross between lickspittle toadies focused only on their personal ladder-climbing and soulless used car salesman willing to say anything regardless of facts.
-Styopa
I don’t think many of us on this side of the pond would object if you arrested our bankers. I also don’t see why you’re taking this moment to give us a hard time. Can’t we take a minute to be astonished together at justice actually being served? That we’re finally seeing executives receive prison time for their wrongdoings, which is exactly what we’re always clamoring for here on Slashdot?
Is the world perfect? No. Has America gotten everything it’s done right? Certainly not. Did we get this one right? Hell, yes, so let’s celebrate this rare victory together.
Notice Germany and the EU hasn't done a damn thing. And no, "fines" don't count. These people all have plenty of money. Shame on the EU.
I notice you don't read non-fake news. Because they have been fined, and criminal proceeding are under way, even in Germany.