Posted on 05/24/2015 12:01:02 PM PDT by jazusamo
General Motors will likely be prosecuted over ignition switches linked to deaths
Federal prosecutors are closing in on criminal charges against General Motors Co. over a faulty ignition switch linked to more than 100 deaths, but they are still weighing whether to charge individual employees, according to people familiar with the matter.
The Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office has determined GM likely broke the law by making misstatements about the ignition-switch glitch in older Chevrolet Cobalts and other cars for more than a decade and will likely extract a fine exceeding $1 billion from the company, the people said. GM will either plead guilty or enter a so-called deferred-prosecution agreement, they said.
A deferred-prosecution agreement would mean the company would face charges that would be suspended and ultimately dismissed if it abides with prosecutors’ terms.
Prosecutors’ investigation is at an advanced stage, though the criminal case may yet fall apart, some of the people said.
Prosecutors believe that GM is likely to strongly argue against a guilty plea, one of the people familiar with the matter said. If the case moves forward, it would be the second brought by U.S. prosecutors in an unprecedented crackdown on auto makers for safety problems.
“We are cooperating fully with all requests, but we are unable to comment on the status of the investigation, including timing,” a GM representative said Saturday.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
Sounds like somebody’s in for a hefty fine. And by somebody, I mean nobody.
Get out your checkbook, America! Time for yet another bailout! Grrrrrr!
GM has so far been untouched by this.
Possible, my friend. The law firm hired by GM has acknowledged 104 deaths at last count plus many injuries.
The criminal fine could exceed the Toyota fine of $1.2Bil.
Hey! I’m all for punishing them if negligent - I just don’t wanna pay for it in the end!
Oh, who am I kidding? I pay for cr@p with my tax dollars that I’d rather NOT, every d@mn day. :)
I’m sure a lot of people at GM knew about this and did nothing, especially the prior CEOs. If the evidence is there, should someone be prosecuted? I think yes. It would definitely send a strong message that this isn’t to be tolerated anymore.
Government Motors is going to indict itself.
Ah yes.. the show goes on!
I hear ya. If GM takes another dive the government had better not come up with another phony bailout, GM should be forced into a normal bankruptcy.
Complete bullshit!!
Any fine will ultimately be paid for by the GM stock holders.
This stuff drives me crazy. A fine provides GM with no incentive to do better.
It's time to start putting people in jail. THAT provides incentive.
Agreed and that’s brought up in the article. An engineer, Raymond DeGiorgio is on the hot seat, if anyone is prosecuted it’ll probably be him.
Yep, there should be many go to jail but I doubt it’s going to happen.
White Racist Tea Party Bush Loving Gun Toting Bible Thumping Christians are to blame!/s
And then there was that young woman in Texas who actually served jail time for vehicular manslaughter when it was the GM ignition switch/loose key that caused the wreck.
I’d forgotten about that, a passenger (boyfriend?) was killed, wasn’t that what happened?
Didn’t GM go light years out of the way to crucify Toyota over what later turned out to be fake “uncontrolled acceleration” events?
(Much as they did with the Audi 5000 back in the 80’s?)
Silly businessmen, to get away with stuff like this you have to work for the government.
Some articles at the following link:
https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=texas+woman+charged+with+manslaughter+ignition+switch+ION
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