“Dieselgate”: nine years after the scandal, the trial of former Volkswagen boss Martin Winterkorn opened this Tuesday

This Tuesday, September 3, 2024, the trial of the ex-boss of  Volkswagen Martin Winterkorn, opened at the Brunswick court in Germany.

The criminal trial of former Volkswagen boss Martin Winterkorn in the “dieselgate” opened on Tuesday, nine years after the revelation of this scandal of rigged engines with global repercussions, which shook the automobile sector.

Now aged 77, he is accused in particular of “organized fraud”. In September 2015, Volkswagen admitted to rigging 11 million cars to display much lower levels of nitrogen oxide pollution than they actually did.

Volkswagen CEO from 2007 to 2015

The former boss of Europe's leading carmaker faces up to 10 years in prison in the Brunswick district court in the north of the country – not far from the manufacturer's historic headquarters in Wolfsburg. His trial, originally scheduled for fall 2021 along with four other former executives, was postponed and disbanded due to Mr. Winterkorn's fragile health after several surgeries.

The former boss was discreet upon his arrival at the court, telling reporters that he was doing “quite well” and that his love of “beautiful cars” had guided his career at the head of the auto giant. The question arises as to its ability to sustain the pace of a long trial with hearings scheduled until mid-2025.

This engineer, who pays close attention to the details of each car, including those of the competition, led Volkswagen from 2007 to 2015, then resigned after the scandal broke.

Under his leadership, the group and its brands VW, Audi, Skoda and Bentley, among others, grew from 330,000 to more than 600,000 employees, and sales climbed from 6.2 to 10 million vehicles worldwide.

His trial opens at a time when the Volkswagen empire, which had turned things around after Dieselgate, is considering a savings plan unprecedented in the history of the company, with the closure factories in Germany and dry layoffs, to deal with an extremely tense situation.

What is the former boss of the car manufacturer accused of ?

Mr Winterkorn is accused of having previously allowed the sale of vehicles equipped with cheating software, despite his knowledge of their existence.

This concerns nine million vehicles, with damages estimated at several hundred million euros. The alleged fraud spans from 2006 to 2015, but the prosecution has only used part of that period against the accused.

He will also face perjury before a parliamentary inquiry in 2017, when he said he only learned of the rigged devices in September 2015. The prosecution says he was informed earlier that year.

Finally, he is accused of market manipulation: once the engine fraud was discovered in the United States in the summer of 2015, Volkswagen risked heavy fines and a fall in its stock price. However, investors were only notified on September 22 of the same year, after the scandal broke.

The central focus of the trial will therefore be determining when exactly Mr Winterkorn became aware of the massive fraud and how he handled this information.

30 billion bill

Among the witnesses expected are Hans Dieter Pötsch, former chief financial officer of Volkswagen, and Herbert Diess, who arrived in July 2015 to lead the VW brand.

These two executives avoided a criminal trial in 2020 thanks to a financial settlement of 9 million euros with the justice.

The Volkswagen group, for its part, "is not involved in the trial", a spokesperson for the group told AFP.

Since 2015, the Wolfsburg group has had to pay out around 30 billion euros in reimbursements, compensation and legal fees, mainly in the United States where the group pleaded guilty to fraud and obstruction of justice.

The only senior Volkswagen executive to be tried to date is former Audi CEO Rupert Stadler was sentenced in June 2023 in Munich to a suspended prison sentence and a fine of 1.1 million euros.