Martin Winterkorn denies charges against him on first day of trial

Former Volkswagen boss Martin Winterkorn, whose trial in the Volkswagen Group’s diesel engine rigging scandal opened on Tuesday, rejects the charges against him, his lawyer said, hoping to show that he did not cover up the industrial scandal. The accused will make a statement on Wednesday regarding the charges that will lead to his appearance.

Mr Winterkorn, now 77, is accused of: “organized gang fraud”In September 2015, Volkswagen admitted to rigging a total of 11 million cars to display significantly lower levels of nitrogen oxide emissions than they actually did.

The former boss of Europe’s largest carmaker faces up to 10 years in prison in the Brunswick district court in the north of the country – not far from the manufacturer’s historic headquarters in Wolfsburg. His trial, originally scheduled for autumn 2021 with four other former executives, had been postponed and dissociated due to Mr Winterkorn’s fragile state of health after several surgeries.

The former boss was discreet upon his arrival at the court, telling reporters that he was “pretty good” and that his love for “beautiful cars” had guided his career at the head of the auto giant. Declaring his civil status before the judges on Tuesday, dressed in a dark suit, Mr. Winterkorn spoke slowly, leaning on the back of a seat.

There are questions about his ability to handle the pace of a lengthy trial, with hearings scheduled to run through mid-2025. His lawyer has said he hopes the case can be decided sooner than expected. Mr. Winterkorn, an engineer who pays close attention to the details of every car, including those of competitors, led Volkswagen from 2007 to 2015, then resigned after the scandal broke.

An unprecedented savings plan

Under his leadership, the group and its brands VW, Audi, Skoda and Bentley, among others, grew from 330,000 to more than 600,000 employees, and sales rose from 6.2 to 10 million vehicles worldwide.

His trial opens at a time when the Volkswagen empire, which had recovered after Dieselgate, is considering a cost-cutting plan unprecedented in the company’s history, with factory closures in Germany and mass layoffs, to deal with an extremely tense situation.

Mr Winterkorn is accused of having previously allowed the sale of vehicles equipped with cheating software, despite knowing of its existence. The alleged fraud spanned from 2006 to 2015 and involved nine million vehicles, with damages estimated at several hundred million euros.

The prosecution claims that Mr Winterkorn was aware “no later than May 2014” of fraud. In addition, he is alleged to have knowingly allowed advertisements to be broadcast promoting the cars as environmentally friendly, with the aim of generating significant profits. He is also accused of deliberately failing to inform the capital market in a timely manner of the financial risks associated with this fraud. The central point of the trial will therefore be to determine when exactly Mr Winterkorn became aware of the massive fraud and how he handled this information.

Expected witnesses include Hans Dieter Pötsch, former Volkswagen CFO, and Herbert Diess, who arrived in July 2015 to lead the VW brand. Both executives avoided criminal trial in 2020 thanks to a €9 million financial settlement with the courts.

The Volkswagen Group, for its part, “is not involved in the trial”according to a spokesperson for the group to Agence France-Presse. Since 2015, the Wolfsburg group has had to pay out around 30 billion euros in reimbursements, compensation and legal fees, mainly in the United States where the group pleaded guilty to fraud and obstruction of justice.