General Motors has filed a new lawsuit against Fiat Chrysler Automobiles in Michigan state court accusing the automaker of bribery and conspiracy.
This new lawsuit comes on the back of the federal racketeering complaint GM filed against Fiat Chrysler Automotbiles in federal court last year, which was dismissed by a judge. GM is currently appealing the court’s decision in that case and filed this new, separate suit in state court.
In addition to suing Fiat Chrysler in state court, GM has also filed two separate state-level suits against former UAW officials Joe Ashton and Alphons Iacobelli. The automaker previously accused Ashton and Iacobelli of conducting corproate espionage on GM in exchange for payment from FCA. The automaker denies these accusations, likening GM’s case to a “third rate spy movie.” Both Ashton and Iacobelli were charged as part of the FBI’s corruption investigation into the UAW.
“General Motors is pursuing claims over which the federal District Courtfor the Eastern District of Michigan declined to exercise jurisdiction andrelated claims — mainly involving breaches of fiduciary duties that individuals owed to GM while they were employees or directors of the company,” GM said in a statement announcing the new lawsuits, as quoted by Automotive News. “The federal court made nodeterminations on the merits of these claims. We look forward to presenting these cases in court.”
Joe Ashton
GM’s statement also reiterated its stance that FCA “provided millions of dollars to co-conspirators via numerous undisclosed offshore bank accounts and utilized such accounts to purchase the support and silence of numerous high-level UAW officers and FCA executives.” Additionally, this latest suit also named the banks allegedly involved in the offshort payments. It accused Ashton of using Shinsei Bank in Japan and Cayman National Bank in the Cayman Islands to receive the spying bribe money, while Iacobelli controlled accounts at a Deutsche Bank in Italy, VP Bank Vaduz in Liechtenstein and a UBS in Switzerland.
The initial RICO suit GM filed against FCA alleged the automaker worked hand-in-hand with the UAW to weaken GM’s business and force it to enter a merger together. GM alleges FCA executives bribed top UAW officials to give it preferential treatment in previous contract discussions, thereby putting GM at a competitive disadvantage.
FCA has not issued a public statement on the new filing in state court, but the automaker has consistently denied GM’s accusations.
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Comments
Gotta recover that 2 billion you just blew on Nikola some type of way. I have had about enough of Mary Barra and her blunders.
They didn’t spend that much money on Nikola.
They were given $2 billion worth of Nikola stock.
They were paid, not the other way around.
It probably was a blunder just the same though.
Man, I kind of feel like maybe GM should just give this up already.
Like i said in the other post about gm and fca, gm just can’t stop crying!
I guess legal fees on this are a non issue for GM.
Right. And has GM’s legal dept. done anything good or productive lately? GM needs to do some housecleaning starting with their legal dept. -Time to reel all their overpaid lawyers in!
Of course they are suing someone again.
The GM of today is not only a vehicle company, they want to be a tech company and a law firm.
GM is just a joke any more, once again:
————————- what the h3ll is going on at GM ? ———————————–
Fire all of your lawyers, and hire some real tech people, some engineers, and some badly needed customer support people.
The new American business model: if you can’t compete sue em’
FCA had their own diesel gate, it was not only Volkswagen. GM must have better engineers, they did not have to cheat with their diesel software. FCA probably was colluding with the UAW to gain advantage over their competition, in particular GM. If you catch a crook it is smart to prosecute to set an example.
No same engineers. GM owned half of the supplier behind the Ecodiesel (VM Motori) and sold their share to FCA right before the scandal motors shipped. The comparable Duramax 3.0 was engineered by the group formerly known as Fiat-GM Powertrain, in the era before Chrysler came into the picture.
The problem when you air everyone’s dirty laundry, yours better be spotless. I am sure all corporations have skeletons in their closet GM included.
It’s amazing how many people get all butt hurt over GM suing, yet Tesla threatens to sue everybody that even thinks about saying something negative, and nobody batts an eye.
Jeez, Mary stop closing down and selling off your overseas operations and stop suing everybody and start making some cars people actually will buy. Toyota and Tesla are laughing all the way to the bank
If electric vehicles take off, massive restructuring will be necessary closing foundries, engine, and transmission plants. The EU makes restructuring near impossible, especially for American companies. GM selling Opel to PSA maybe the smart move. PSA got old factories, a mediocre brand, and huge future restructuring costs. As far as Australia, all manufacturers closed their Australian manufacturing operations, including Toyota.
You almost hit it on the nail, GM is bitter about the impending Peugeot (a company that owns GM’s OPEL operations) merger with FCA.
Why build in America with this nonsense going on? 🙄
Mary’s legacy will be failed lawsuits.
There is no question the UAW, FIAT and Sergio were in bed together. Now Sergio is dead and many UAW leaders are going to prison for taking kickbacks to lower costs for him. The whole structure of the bailout was corrupt from the start. People don’t want the truth because it might hurt the lies they fell for?
As long as unions have power, tons of money will continue to be poured into legal fees on both sides, ultimately doing nothing but increasing the prices for domestic automobiles.
GM has not paid back government loan used to bail out FCA paid back 2 years early
GM paid back everything they were supposed to within 5 years.
Stop making things up.
Go ask Steve Ratner what happened. And as you have already been told, stop either making things up or repeating a lie.
GM legal depth must have quite a lot of evidence to support their suit. If it ever goes to court an GM looses, it Is big time to pay the court and expenses.
Stop the nonsense and concentrate on getting up to speed on a better, more diversified models.