Volkswagen Engineer Gets Prison in Diesel Cheating Case
Federal prosecutors recommended a three-year sentence and a $20,000 fine,
but Judge Sean F. Cox of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan gave Mr. Liang a longer sentence, as well as two years of supervised release and a $200,000 fine.
DETROIT — A Volkswagen engineer was sentenced on Friday to 40 months in prison for his role in the German automaker’s
decade-long scheme to cheat on federal emissions tests for diesel-powered cars sold in the United States.
Although his cooperation with investigators has helped the government’s cases against the company
and other Volkswagen executives, the judge said it was not enough to allow Mr. Liang to be sentenced to home confinement, as his lawyer had requested.
“He was not the mastermind, but he did play a role,” Mr. Nixon said, adding
that Mr. Liang never benefited financially from aiding in the development of so-called defeat devices that masked the high levels of harmful diesel emissions.
The judge said Mr. Liang and other Volkswagen executives and employees were responsible for a “massive and stunning fraud”
that violated the trust that consumers need to have in goods and services purchased from corporations.
