Former CEO investigated over VW emissions scandal
Probe will look at when investors were informed
BERLIN — German prosecutors are investigating former Volkswagen CEO Martin Winterkorn and another unnamed executive over allegations they didn’t inform investors soon enough about the company’s scandal over cars rigged to cheat on U.S. diesel emissions tests.
The Braunschweig prosecutor’s spokesperson, Matthias Diekman, said in a statement Monday that the probe was opened at the behest of Germany’s Federal Financial Supervisory Authority, the country’s financial watchdog.
German stock market law requires publicly traded companies to alert investors as soon as they have unforeseen developments that could affect a decision to buy or sell the stock. Prosecutors said that Volkswagen only made that notification on Sept. 22, and that there was evidence that the disclosure obligation should have been fulfilled earlier.
Volkswagen said it had the issue reviewed by outside lawyers who found “no clear or serious violations of duty” and that the prosecutor’s statement contained “no new facts or findings over possible violations” by the two executives.
Volkswagen has said Winterkorn was sent a memo on May 23, 2014, about emissions irregularities uncovered by an environmental group, but the company was not sure he saw it, and said that top officials discussed the matter on July 27, 2015.
The company said earlier that the issue was believed to be something that could be resolved through a settlement that would not impose heavy costs, and it still believed that to be the case in early September 2015.
On Sept. 18, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued a violation notice, leading Volkswagen to assess the risks as more serious and issue its investor advisory four days later.
The prosecutors’ news release said that the second employee is not the current board of directors’ chair, Hans Dieter Poetsch. Poetsch was chief financial officer under Winterkorn but has since left that post.