National Post (National Edition)
AUTHORITIES RAID VOLKSWAGEN HQ
AJAX, ONT. • Investigators for Ontario’s Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change raided the headquarters of Volkswagen Canada on Tuesday morning, executing a search warrant as part of the massive international investigation into “cheat devices” meant to evade emissions regulations.
A team of 24 officers, including computer experts from the Ministry of Finance, arrived at the Volkswagen Canada campus in Toronto’s eastern suburbs at 9:30 a.m., seeking evidence to support a newly laid charge against Volkswagen AG, the automaker’s German parent company, for violating Ontario’s Environmental Protection Act.
When asked if the company was cooperating with the warrant, ministry investigator Warren Korol said: “I’m not certain yet; we’re still searching.”
As of noon, they had not removed anything, but an agent could be seen carrying a large cooler into the building, and a ministry van was parked by the reception door.
“In any search warrant, there’s always a list of things we’re searching for, and if we find those things, yes, we’ll be seizing them,” Korol said.
The information to obtain the search warrant, which includes details of what the investigators were seeking, is sealed to the public until it has been fully executed. The raid was not co-ordinated with other jurisdictions, nor were there simultaneous raids, Korol said.
Thomas Tetzlaff, Volkswagen Canada’s manager of public relations, said the investigators came unannounced, and that the company is co-operating. “We’ll continue to co-operate with them until they have the information they require,” he said. He said he did not know if they had taken anything yet.
“This kind of came out of the blue for us,” he said. “As such, it’s not something we find worrisome or troubling.
“We’re not hiding anything,” he said. “Since the outset of this, we’ve been cooperating with any and all agencies that have asked us for information.”
The raid comes two years and a day after a global emissions scandal involving several Volkswagen models erupted.
In September 2015, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced it had evidence that millions of Volkswagen vehicles were programmed to detect when emissions were being tested, and to alter their engine function to reduce nitrogen oxide emissions during the test. In some cases, the regular emission rate was 40 times higher than in test mode.
The fallout walloped the automaker’s stock price and prompted criminal charges, a major class action lawsuit, and other civil actions. Volkswagen’s chief executive was forced to resign, and the company pleaded guilty to criminal charges in the United States, and was ordered to pay a US$2.8-billion fine.
The scheme to defeat emissions testing affected 11 million vehicles, including the brands Jetta, Golf and Beetle, all with the TDI engine, short for turbocharged direct injection.
An order of Ontario’s Environmental Registry, issued last year, describes how Volkswagen AG “admitted responsibility for the installation of a defeat mechanism globally that may bypass, defeat or render inoperative the emissions control technology on certain diesel vehicles. Volkswagen Group Canada Inc. has imported and sold a number of the affected vehicles in Ontario, which includes 2.0 litre, 4 Cylinder TDI diesel engine vehicles. Ontario’s environmental legislation prohibits the sale of vehicles that do not meet emissions standards.”
The order goes on to describe Volkswagen Canada’s efforts to resolve the matter, with a plan to fix the cars, in co-operation with the provincial ministry.
Environment and Climate Change Canada, the federal ministry, is the lead agency for investigating the importation and sale of Volkswagen vehicles with the defeat device. This newest charge, however, is for the provincial offence of causing vehicles to operate with higher than allowed emissions levels.
The charge is against the German parent company, but investigators were looking for evidence of the alleged offence that might be in the possession of the Canadian subsidiary.
“We have no reason to believe that (the Canadian subsidiary has) committed any offences,” Korol said.
An information sheet sworn on Friday with the Ontario Court of Justice in Whitby by provincial officer Dean Lemcke says he has “reasonable and probable grounds” to believe that Volkswagen AG “did commit the offence of causing or permitting the operation of motor vehicles … that did not comply with the prescribed emissions standards.”
Those include Volkswagen and Audi vehicles with 2.0 litre diesel engines from the model years 2010 to 2014.
The information sheet describes a summons issued to Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft at its headquarters in Wolfsburg-Sonderbezirk, Lower Saxony, Germany. That summons has a return date later this year.
Gary Wheeler, a spokesman for the Ontario ministry, said the charge “relates to the alleged after-sale modification of certain Volkswagen vehicles that impacted the operation of their emission control systems.”
Any penalty for this charge would be determined after conviction by a court, he said.