The first criminal judgments in the processing of the VW diesel scandal have been made. The Munich Regional Court sentenced ex-Audi boss Stadler to a suspended sentence of one year and nine months for fraud.
In the Volkswagen emissions scandal, former Audi boss Rupert Stadler has been sentenced to a suspended sentence of one year and nine months. The court found him guilty of fraud. He also has to pay a fine of 1.1 million euros.
The two co-defendants also received suspended sentences for fraud. For the former Head of Audi Engines and later Porsche Board Member Wolfgang Hatz, it is two years and 400,000 euros, for the engineer Giovanni P. one year and nine months and 50,000 euros.
The proceedings against a fourth defendant, who had confessed early as a key witness, were discontinued in April against payment of a monetary condition. Today’s judgments are not yet final.
The suspects confessed to the allegations
These are the first criminal judgments in Germany in the diesel scandal at the Volkswagen group. The fraud was uncovered in 2015, which shook the entire automotive industry and caused billions in damage. Stadler is the first former member of the Volkswagen Group board to be convicted.
After more than two and a half years of trial, the court proposed a deal to the accused in March: If there were confessions, there would be suspended sentences with monetary conditions, then nobody would have to go to prison. The three men then fully admitted the allegations.
Device manipulated exhaust gas values
Hatz and the engineer confessed to having manipulated engines. According to the indictment, legal exhaust gas values were met on the test bench, but not on the road. Stadler, on the other hand, is not accused of any active manipulation. After the scandal broke in the USA, however, he is said to have failed to stop the sale of the manipulated cars in Germany.
Stadler has admitted this for its part. In the case of Stadler and the engineer, the public prosecutor’s office supported the deals. In the case of the former Audi engine boss and later Porsche board member Hatz, however, the public prosecutor’s office blocked the court’s proposal and demanded a prison sentence of three years and two months.
Charges against other former Audi managers
Four former top managers of the Volkswagen Group have been on trial in Braunschweig since September 2021 for possible fraud in the diesel affair. The case against former VW CEO Martin Winterkorn is on hold due to illness.
The Munich public prosecutor’s office had already indicted four other former Audi managers in 2020 – three former colleagues on the board of Stadler and the long-standing head of the main diesel engine department at Audi. It is still unclear whether and when this process will begin.