1400 investor lawsuits seek 8.2 billion euros from VW

About 1,400 lawsuits are now pending at a court in Braunschweig, about 20 miles from Volkswagen’s Wolfsburg headquarters, a judicial spokeswoman said Wednesday.

The regional court in Braunschweig said Wednesday it has received 1,400 lawsuits seeking 8.2 billion euros, or $9.2 billion.

A year ago, an investigation in the USA found that VW had cheated emissions tests for diesel cars by using special software.

Last September, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) discovered that many VW cars being sold in the USA had a “defeat device” in diesel engines which detected when they were being tested and could change performance accordingly to improve results. The Seoul prosecutors summoned seven officials from the German headquarters for questioning in July through the representative of the German automaker’s local unit Audi Volkswagen Korea but only one has so far complied.

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The amount is less than the 10.7 billion euros that had been expected based on lawyers’ statements last week, but more suits could still trickle in because of uncertainty about when the deadline expires.

The US government is among the investors suing and seeking €30 million.

The court said it has taken on extra staff and hired additional storage space to cope – as the avalanche represents half the number of cases the tribunal normally hears in a year. They’re still down 11 percent this year. Blackrock, another top investor, is also reported to be suing the company.

The VW group has set aside €18bn to pay for the legal costs of the crisis, and has so far agreed to pay $15bn in compensation and fines in the USA alone.

A VW engineer James Liang became the first to be charged as part of the US Justice Departments year-long criminal probe into the firm’s rigging of federal air-pollution tests after pleading guilty earlier this month to violation of the clean air act, a wire fraud count and a consumer fraud count and. Porsche Holding, which is controlled by the Porsche-Piech family, owns a majority of Volkswagen’s voting stock and is effectively its parent company.

Porsche spokesman Albrecht Bamler said he will comment on the case later Wednesday.