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First Book About Dieselgate Identifies Whistleblower, His Lawyer Says No Comment

Faster, Higher, Farther: The Volkswagen Scandal, is the title of the first book about the German company’s wrongdoings with its diesel engines.
Stripped-out Volkswagen Golf 2.0 TDI 1 photo
Photo: Screenshot from YouTube video by Jalopnik
It was written by a New York Times reporter named Jack Ewing, and it is available for pre-order for $17.98 on Amazon in the hardcover version.

We already know that a movie will be made about the Wolfsburg-based company’s cheating scheme, but this book reportedly reveals the name of the whistle-blower who notified authorities that the corporation was lying.

The reporter asserts that an American executive of the German automaker was the first to disclose the criminal acts of the company to U.S. regulators.

According to Automotive News, whose editors received a review copy of the book from its publisher, W. W. Norton & Co., the name of the whistle-blower is Stuart Johnson.

Among Mr. Johnson’s duties as head of Volkswagen’s Engineering and Environmental Office in Auburn Hills, Michigan, was interacting with American regulators. His attorney, Scott Lassar, has told reporters that he declined to comment on behalf of his client when asked about the book and the situation.

The publication also contacted the representatives of VW Group of America, and their spokesperson also declined to comment.

It is worth noting that the author quoted an interview with Alberto Ayala, the deputy executive director of the California Air Resources Board, where the institution’s official named Mr. Johnson as the first person to expose the existence of the "defeat device" in VW Group’s ECUs of TDI engines to CARB.

Initially, the suspicion that Volkswagen had been using a cheat to make its vehicles comply with government emissions tests appeared after an independent analysis found that the TDI engines of the EA189 series were not as clean in on-road driving as they were on the dyno.

From there, people thought that the American government’s authorities decided to employ a probe, but the possibility of a whistle-blower was overseen until recently.

It seems that people will have to buy the book and make their personal conclusions on the topic.
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About the author: Sebastian Toma
Sebastian Toma profile photo

Sebastian's love for cars began at a young age. Little did he know that a career would emerge from this passion (and that it would not, sadly, involve being a professional racecar driver). In over fourteen years, he got behind the wheel of several hundred vehicles and in the offices of the most important car publications in his homeland.
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