The revelation that ended Martin Winterkorn's career at Volkswagen AG came on Sept. 3 in a meeting at an office park east of Los Angeles.
After months of obfuscation, company engineers finally divulged a secret to engineers at the California Environmental Protection Agency's Air Resources Board: Volkswagen had installed a "defeat device" to cheat on vehicle emissions tests — and then lied about it to the board and the U.S. EPA for more than a year.
On Sept. 23, Europe's largest automaker announced that Winterkorn, its 68-year-old chief executive officer, had resigned. While the company exonerated him of involvement in the manipulations, it said it will conduct an internal investigation and has asked local German prosecutors to assist and open a criminal probe.