3 ex-Fiat Chysler engineers indicted over emissions cheating

The Justice Department on Tuesday indicted three former Fiat Chrysler engineers for their role in designing enginecontrol systems that allowed some of its diesel vehicles to cheat on emissions tests.

The indictment, in the U.S. District Court in Detroit, was handed down by a grand jury in March and unsealed Tuesday. Fiat Chrysler merged with Peugeot SA this year and is now known as Stellantis.

The engineers are Emanuele Palma, a diesel-calibration manager in Auburn Hills, Mich., who had been previously charged by federal prosecutors; Sergio Pasini, the head calibration engineer who supervised Palma, who lives in Italy; and Gianluca Sabbioni, a technical director, also from Italy.

The indictment accuses the engineers of developing software — known inside the company as “T-engine” — that could increase the use of emissions-control systems when vehicles were undergoing emissions testing and could decrease them when driven by customers in realworld conditions.

Lowering the controls made the vehicles appear more fuel-efficient, an achievement that the company highlighted when selling the cars. The software was used in 3-liter diesel engines that were available on the Jeep Grand Cherokee and Ram 1500 pickups. Fiat Chrysler marketed the models as “clean” diesel and “best-in-class” fuel economy.

In 2019, Fiat Chrysler agreed to settle emissions-cheating allegations with the federal and state governments in a deal that was estimated to cost the company nearly $800 million.