Gregory's ServerA VW exec went to prison for this (in the US). Why isn't prison on the menu for Cummins?
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9 comments
 @1dalm @artemesia @jalefkowit unfortunate that the criminal responsibility of the executives that directed this is transformed into a $ penalty for Cummins shareholders, employees, and customers. Are the responsible executives even paying fines and penaties personally? @johnefrancis @artemesia @jalefkowit (Switching over to my science-y/engineering-y account) I am an Environmental Engineer, with a specialty in hazmat releases and have been involved in many enforcement cases like this where I'm called in to investigate and report. (Obviously orders of magnitude smaller cases than this, and obviously I'm not involved in this specific case so everything I say is speculation.) That said, burning 3 years of profits in fines is not nothing for a company like this. Looking at their financials, they didn't have $1.7+ billion in cash on hand, so they will probably have to take on some pretty expensive debt to pay this off or sell off assets. There will probably be a pretty good shake up of the board from the share holders, likely including additional shareholder lawsuits. The responsible executives are going to be dealing with this daily for years. As for the workers, I actually think they are probably sitting in a pretty good position. Cummins agreed to a recall of 600,000 Ram trucks. The workers are going to be plenty busy, and safely employed, for years. The customers will probably also be able to file a class action suit. Meanwhile, the tax payers get to avoid a lengthy, costly, and risky trial. (With a very pro-business SCOTUS, do you really want to roll those dice?) So, I think this is likely as big of a regulatory win as a regulated free market can get. And it's definitely a big win. Plea deal BS. It's an extremely serious offence they committed. Whoever made the call to install a "defeat device" should, of course never work in a management position again, or at least not until they have served some time. Basically, justice should be seen to be done. Or there is a high chance that the crooks will do it again. BS when rich people can pay a fine to avoid prison, when for a more minor criminal act, a "poor" person would do time. @ScienceCommunicator @artemesia @jalefkowit Prosecutors have to be allowed to bargain for plea deals. You want to take the clean air act to SCOTUS right now?  @1dalm @ScienceCommunicator @jalefkowit VW resulted in prosecutions. It is mostly the same assholes on the SC now as then. |
@artemesia @jalefkowit
That's probably part of the plea deal. The plea deal probably came with a "no criminal charges" clause. Cummins executives probably knew that criminal charges were a possibility so that encouraged them to settle more quickly for a much higher number than they otherwise would without going to trial.
Cummins isn't *that* big of a company. $1.6 billion is a big hit. It's 3 years of profits for them. And other states will probably follow California with their own law suits.