German Volkswagen investigation expands to include tax evasion

German prosecutors have widened their investigation of Volkswagen to include suspicions of tax evasion linked to the emissions cheating scandal. The company acknowledges that so-called “auxiliary emissions control devices” – the software used to help the cars pass the tests – were “not sufficiently described and declared” for United States approval, and that one “is regarded as a defeat device according to applicable US law”.

If this doesn’t make sense to some people outside Germany is because not all countries calculate yearly taxes based on Carbon dioxide emission, but the Germans do, and they use the numbers provided by manufacturers to calculate the quotas.

The investigation is focused on five unnamed VW employees after incorrect emissions data was published, which gave a number of motorists tax breaks that may have been unjustified. The investigation is looking into suspected tax evasion that could amount to millions of euros, German newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung and German broadcasters Norddeutscher Rundfunk and Westdeutscher Rundfunk said in a joint report, via Reuters.

The investigation announced on Tuesday by the public prosecutor in the northwestern city of Braunschweig is another blow to Europe’s largest automaker, which finds itself already mired in an emissions scandal. It is unclear if owners will be forced to pay additional taxes on vehicles.

“The efforts [needed] to carry out the refits are technically, mechanically and financially manageable”, Mueller told at meeting of about 1,000 VW managers at the company’s headquarters in Wolfsburg, Germany. If approved, the fix for 85,000 Audi, Volkswagen and Porsche cars with 3.0-liter diesel engines should cost roughly $53 million.