Former Audi CEO Rupert Stadler sentenced over diesel scandal

Former Audi CEO Rupert Stadler was sentenced on Tuesday by a German court over Volkswagen Group’s diesel scandal that first erupted in 2015.

He was handed a one-year suspended sentence and fined 1.1 million euros (approximately $1.2 million) after admitting to his role in the scandal in May, making him the first former VW Group board member to be sentenced in relation to the scandal.

He was originally charged in 2019 and has been on trial since 2020.

Via a lawyer, Stadler said he wasn’t aware of the so-called defeat device software designed to block emissions during testing by regulators but recognized it was a possibility and that there was a need for more care, Reuters reported.

Wolfgang Hatz, Audi’s former head of powertrain development and the head of R&D at Porsche when the scandal broke, was given a two-year suspended sentence for fraud and a fine of 400,000 euros, while another engineer, Zaccheo Giovanni Pamio, received 21 months and a fine of 50,000 euros.

Martin Winterkorn, who was CEO of VW Group when the scandal broke, has also been charged but his court proceedings in Germany have stalled due to his health issues. He also faces charges by U.S. authorities but cannot be extradited from Germany.

The fallout from the scandal has cost the VW Group more than $30 billion in buybacks, fixes, and fines. While a number a number of individuals have been sentenced, so far only two have received prison terms, in both cases in the U.S. They include Oliver Schmidt who in 2017 received a seven-year prison sentence, and James Liang who that same year received a four-year sentence.