By on November 24, 2015

Volkswagen Polo

German investigators are looking into whether Volkswagen executives or engineers broke laws by lying about carbon dioxide emissions in 800,000 cars sold in Europe, the New York Times reported.

Authorities near the automaker’s headquarters in Wolfsburg say they are focused on five Volkswagen employees, but wouldn’t identify those employees. Investigators are determining if Volkswagen employees knowingly provided false information to authorities about those cars and their emissions to qualify those cars for lower tax rates. In admitting that it lied about its emissions levels this month, Volkswagen said it would repay governments for back tax revenue lost because of the bogus claims.

This month, Volkswagen admitted it underestimated carbon dioxide output from 800,000 cars sold in Europe and said the scandal could cost the company more than $2.1 billion. According to the New York Times report, Volkswagen’s admission included a promise to repay taxes owed on owners’ cars it sold with bogus carbon dioxide numbers.

Volkswagen could face similar levies by European governments for its broader, deeper scandal with their diesel-powered cars. Millions of those cars in Europe will need costlier fixes, and emissions levels for those cars could have exceeded by several times the legal limit.

Volkswagen set aside more than $7 billion to pay for its diesel scandal, but that’s likely to be a fraction of the overall cost to the automaker.

On Monday, Volkswagen announced the German transportation authority approved initial fixes for about 70 percent of the cars on the road there. The fixes for its 1.2- and 1.6-liter engines (not sold in the U.S.) and some 2-liter diesel engines would likely be software updates and bigger air filters that would cost about $10.

Last week, Volkswagen submitted its plan to U.S. regulators to fix their illegally polluting cars. According to the California Air Resources Board, officials have up to 20 days to review the proposed fix.

Get the latest TTAC e-Newsletter!

Recommended

2 Comments on “Volkswagen Workers Under Criminal Investigation for Breaking Tax Laws in Germany...”


  • avatar
    sirwired

    Well, tax fraud is how they got Al Capone…

  • avatar
    wmba

    We get such opaque writing these days here.

    This article is ostensibly about VW lying about mileage claims, or CO2 on gasoline-powered vehicles

    Then it rambles off into other areas, presumably about NOx, which is about the diesels.

    I wouldn’t object to some clarity as I’m not convinced the author really knows what he’s writing about.

Read all comments

Back to TopLeave a Reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Recent Comments

  • Lou_BC: @Carlson Fan – My ’68 has 2.75:1 rear end. It buries the speedo needle. It came stock with the...
  • theflyersfan: Inside the Chicago Loop and up Lakeshore Drive rivals any great city in the world. The beauty of the...
  • A Scientist: When I was a teenager in the mid 90’s you could have one of these rolling s-boxes for a case of...
  • Mike Beranek: You should expand your knowledge base, clearly it’s insufficient. The race isn’t in...
  • Mike Beranek: ^^THIS^^ Chicago is FOX’s whipping boy because it makes Illinois a progressive bastion in the...

New Car Research

Get a Free Dealer Quote

Who We Are

  • Adam Tonge
  • Bozi Tatarevic
  • Corey Lewis
  • Jo Borras
  • Mark Baruth
  • Ronnie Schreiber