BETTER PARTSThe wave of lawsuits against VW rolls
Wolfsburg, October 8, 2015
Claims by investors, complaints from customers, actions of authorities: The process wave against VW builds up. Now the US state of Texas is taking legal action against VW and Audi. The allegations of prosecutor Ken Paxton: First, the two marks have consumers misled with the label " clean diesel" and secondly, the Texas air pollution control laws have been violated, the message on the website of the Prosecutor's Office.
Suits from Austria to Australia
Even the end of September had the Texas Harris County VW sued because the Diesel Group had made it impossible for the district to comply with air pollution control regulations and to protect its citizens from health hazards. But not only in the US, also in many other countries around the world, from Austria to Australia, the rolling wave of lawsuits. Spain wants to return, for example, subsidies for the purchase of low-emission cars.
Disclosure Requirements hurt?
As the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reported on October 1, a VW shareholder has already filed a lawsuit. Perhaps not entirely wrong. Because it turns out that the top management has already known early by trickery, to give knowledge without the public, this could constitute a breach of the ad hoc disclosure obligations: A public company must publish all the facts without delay, that can significantly affect the market price.
Even buyers are already complaining
A German VW customer also wants to return their car to VW is to remove matching messages of different media. You would have chosen for environmental reasons for a BlueMotion model and taken the additional costs in purchasing. The remedy offered was not enough, because that would Motor power, acceleration and top speed fall. If the repair is to be carried out by a software update, the buyer might be right, because usually have lower emissions reachable only by sacrificing performance. But if decreases horsepower, one could interpret as the absence of an assured property, and entitles the buyer usually for rescission of the sale contract.
Raid on Thursday
Even criminal proceedings against the VW Group in Germany are possible. So there have been raids at VW in different places last Thursday ( October 7 ). Three prosecutors and 50 investigators searched for evidence of offenses. The results are not yet known, probably the investigators dig now only times through the mountains of files. Whether the police so one day Martin Winterkorn publicity accompanied from his home, as it was in 2008, the Deutsche Post CEO Klaus Zumwinkel? One will have to wait, but completely ruled out is not this extreme scenario more . ( sl )