The company declines to comment, cites legal case VW ‘misused’ me, accused official says

Berlin, Dec. 3: Volkswagen AG (VW) executive Oliver Schmidt, who is due to be sentenced this week in connection with the emissions scandal, has written to the judge to say he feels “misused” by the company, a newspaper reported on Sunday.

Mr Schmidt pleaded guilty in August in the US District Court in Detroit to wrongdoing connected to a massive diesel emissions scandal that has cost VW as much as $30 billion. He is due to be sentenced on December 6.

“I must say that I feel misused by my own company in the diesel scandal or ‘Dieselgate’,” Mr Schmidt wrote to US judge Sean Cox, according to a letter filed in federal court.

The letter was originally published by Bild am Sonntag newspaper.

A VW spokesman declined to comment, citing the ongoing proceedings.

Under a plea agreement, Mr Schmidt faces up to seven years in prison and charge of the company’s a fine of between $40,000 environmental and engineering and $400,000 after admitting office in Auburn to conspiring to mislead Hills, Michigan, until the US regulators and February 2015, where he violating clean air laws. oversaw emissions issues.

In March, VW pleaded In the letter to the judge, guilty to three felony he said he had agreed to counts under a plea agreement follow a script, or talking to resolve US points, agreed by charges it installed secret the VW management software in vehicles to and a high-ranking evade emissions tests. lawyer, at a meeting

US prosecutors have with Alberto Ayala, a charged eight current and California Air former VW executives. Resources Board executive.

Mr Schmidt was in

I should have gone to that meeting and ignored the instructions given to me and told Dr Ayala that there is a defeat device in the VW diesel engine vehicles and that VW had been cheating for almost a decade. — OLIVER SCHMIDT, Former VW official

“In hindsight, I should never have agreed to meet with Dr Ayala on that day,” he wrote. —