It may have fallen out of the headlines, but the Volkswagen “diesel-gate” scandal is not over for the former head of the German car company.
Martin Winterkorn, former VW CEO, told media on September 3 that he’s not guilty of the legal charges he’s facing in court this week in the German city of Braunschweig, through his lawyer, Felix Doerr.
VW has already admitted back in 2015 that it falsified emissions tests to make its vehicles appear cleaner than they are. The company used software during laboratory tests to make its diesel-burning cars appear to give off less pollution in controlled tests than the vehicles actually emitted on the road in real-world use. Winterkorn is facing fraud charges, and if he is convicted, may be sentenced to up to 10 years in prison.
Winterkorn resigned his job shortly after the scandal broke, and several attempts to get him to trial in the past failed. Most recently he was to appear in court in 2021 along with four other VW executives, but the cases were split apart and Winterkorn’s was delayed because of his health troubles.
He remains unrepentant, telling reporters outside the courtroom that he was doing well, and that he looked back fondly on his work for VW when he saw the “beautiful cars.” Inside the courtroom, he appeared frail and leaned on furniture when he was standing. It has been reported that the 77-year-old had an operation this past June. The case schedule is full, with 89 hearings scheduled through the beginning of fall, 2025.
Winterkorn’s lawyer Doerr said his time was sure they could manage to get the trial over with before a full year.
Winterkorn is accused of conspiracy to commit fraud for selling nine million vehicles under false pretenses to consumers who thought they were lighter on emissions than they were, thanks to software-fiddling VW injected into its tests. These cars were sold in both the U.S. and Europe, and prosecutors say that customers are out many hundreds of millions of euros as a result.
The former car exec is also facing accusations that he gave false testimony to the German parliament in 2017 when it was investigating the issue. Winterkorn said he only became aware of the fraud involving so-called “defeat devices”—these were used to falsify emissions measurements—in September of 2015, but prosecutors say he knew about them before that time.
Winterkorn has already entered into a settlement with his former employer in which he is on the hook to pay the company $12 million (in American dollars) for his part in the scandal. Volkswagen is not part of this prosecution against its former executive.
