The payments will be dolled out to various plaintiffs, including Schneiderman’s own state of NY, which will use $115 million for environmental projects to improve air quality, and another $30 million to the state’s general fund.
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New York’s attorney general filed a lawsuit Tuesday explaining how top executives at Volkswagen were responsible for covering up the company’s fuel emission scandal for more than 15 years.
The state lawsuits were a blow after Europe’s largest automaker reached a crucial milestone last month by hammering out a $15.3 billion settlement with US authorities.
“It is regrettable that some states have chose to sue for environmental claims now, notwithstanding their prior support of this ongoing federal-state collaborative process”, VW said.
“This cover-up was deep, wide and long-lasting”.
“With today’s action, we want to make clear to all auto manufacturers that violating laws created to protect our environment and our public health is unacceptable and will be punished with significant penalties”, said Healey.
VW’s Audi and Porsche units, as well as their US divisions, are named as defendants in the lawsuits. Volkswagen said returns from its cost-saving program also contributed.
VW also faced legal action from shareholders and criminal investigations in many other countries.
“Despite Dieselgate VW reported the best quarterly operating profit ever, ” said Michael Punzet, an automotive analyst at DZ Bank AG, adding that he maintained a “skeptical view on VW” because of remaining uncertainties about the company’s core business and fallout from the emissions-cheating scandal. The lawsuit does not mention Müller in a list of executives and engineers alleged to have discussed the development of defeat devices. Engineers developed a technology that could eliminate traditional clattering noise of engines at start-up but it caused vehicles to exceed European emissions standards.
“In 1999, Audi used a defeat device to solve the problem during testing”, NY said.
VW got around the deficiency by installing the defeat devices on almost 300,000 vehicles it marketed as “clean diesel” cars in the U.S. Cars with model years 2009 through 2015 ended up with the software.
The group said it expects sales revenue to be down as much as 5% compared to previous year, as it factors in the impact of the emissions scandal and the current “economic conditions”, particularly in South America and Russian Federation.
All three suits allege violations of the states’ environmental laws, Reuters reports.
The latest lawsuit cites emails and other documents to allege a prolonged effort among dozens of Volkswagen employees in the US and Germany to equip vehicles with the devices and stonewall inquiries from regulators. Martin Winterkorn, the CEO of Volkswagen who resigned shortly after the scandal became public, is one of the executives identified in the suit.
The company insists that senior management did not know about the defeat device, a claim contested by the suits filed Tuesday. That includes a $2.7 billion fund that states can use for environmental needs, VW noted.
“They knew what they were going to do was illegal, and if caught they would face government enforcement and sanctions”, a statement on the case says.
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“This was a widespread conspiracy involving many, many people”, New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman said at a press conference.
