By Jörn Poltz
(Reuters) – Former Audi boss Rupert Stadler was handed a suspended sentence of one year and nine months by a Munich court on Tuesday for fraud in the 2015 diesel scandal, becoming the first former Volkswagen board member to receive such a sentence.
The ex-boss was fined 1.1 million euros ($1.20 million), which will go to the state treasury and non-governmental organisations, the court said.
Further ongoing cases include a criminal case against other former managers of Volkswagen taking place in Braunschweig, and a case against former Volkswagen boss Martin Winterkorn on hold due to problems with his health.
Stadler’s sentence is in the middle of the 1.5-2 year timeframe the judge had said the former CEO would face if he confessed to the charge.
The case is among the most prominent in the aftermath of the diesel scandal, when parent group Volkswagen and Audi admitted in 2015 to having used illegal software to cheat on emissions tests.
Stadler was accused of failing to stop the sale of the manipulated cars in Germany after the scandal became known.
He had previously rejected the allegations.
But speaking on Stadler’s behalf in May, his lawyer Ulrike Thole-Groll said that while he did not know that vehicles had been manipulated and buyers had been harmed, he recognised it was a possibility and accepted that there he should have taken more care.
Prosecutors had originally wanted a 2-million-euro fine, citing Stadler’s salaries at Audi and Volkswagen and his financial and real estate assets.
Two further defendants accused of manipulating motors -former Audi executive Wolfgang Hatz, and engineer Giovanni P. – were sentenced on Tuesday, with Hatz facing a two-year suspended sentence with a 400,000 euro fine and Giovanni P. a year and nine months and a 50,000 euro fine.
The prosecutor’s office and the accused can appeal until July 4.
($1 = 0.9141 euros)
(Reporting by Joern Poltz, Victoria Waldersee; editing by Friederike Heine, Jason Neely and David Evans)
