"When regulators expressed concerns, Volkswagen obfuscated," Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch said at a news conference in Washington. "And they ultimately lied."
Extracting a guilty plea from a major corporation is a notable feat for an administration that has been accused of allowing companies to buy themselves out of indictments through so-called deferred prosecution deals.
But the charges against the Volkswagen executives are just as striking and show that prosecutors are determined to hold the company's highest ranks to account.
The Volkswagen case is the first major test of a Justice Department commitment to hold executives more accountable. In 2015, Deputy Attorney General Sally Q. Yates issued new policies that prioritized the prosecution of individuals at corporations accused of wrongdoing. The policies were a response to criticism that the department had been too soft on Wall Street executives after the financial crisis.
"We can't put companies in jail, but we can hold employees accountable, and we can force companies to pay hefty fines," said Andrew McCabe, the deputy director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
"This case is a great example of the fact that no corporation is too big, no corporation is too global, and no person is beyond the law," he said.
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Volkswagen has admitted that 11 million of its vehicles were equipped with software that was used to cheat on emissions tests. The company is now contending with the fallout.
The five Volkswagen employees charged on Wednesday were Heinz-Jakob Neusser, 56, who oversaw development of the company's brand; Jens Hadler, 50, who oversaw engine development; Richard Dorenkamp, 68, another supervisor of engine development; Bernd Gottweis, 69, who helped oversee quality management; and Jürgen Peter, 59, who was a liaison between regulatory agencies and the carmaker.
They and Mr. Schmidt were charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States, defraud customers and violate the Clean Air Act.
It was unclear whether the five executives named on Wednesday would ever appear in a United States court. If they are in Germany, the country does not normally extradite its citizens.
Even if Germany does not extradite or prosecute them, the charges in the United States would severely limit their ability to travel. The case could also set up a diplomatic tussle between Germany and the administration of President-elect Donald J. Trump, though Mr. Trump's stance on the case is far from clear.
Ms. Lynch said she could not speculate on whether Germany would hand over the five charged. Still, she said: "We've always worked very well with our German colleagues."
Regulators in the United States first began to investigating Volkswagen early in 2014 after a study by West Virginia University showed that its diesel cars polluted far more on the road than during official emissions tests.
Company executives knew that the cars were programmed to recognize when they were being tested and to deliver optimum pollution readings, according to investigators. But rather than admit wrongdoing, Volkswagen representatives provided false and misleading information for more than a year to the California Air Resources Board and the E.P.A.
Mr. Schmidt was arrested on Saturday at Miami International Airport as he was about to board a flight to Germany. In September, a former Volkswagen engineer who worked for the company in California, James Liang, pleaded guilty to charges that included conspiracy to defraud the federal government and violating the Clean Air Act.
None of the executives charged on Wednesday were members of the Volkswagen management board, although several of them reported directly to the board. The lack of accusations against any top managers could help insulate Volkswagen from lawsuits by shareholders who have accused the company of failing to disclose the risks it faced.
Several of those charged on Wednesday played management roles in the development of the diesel engines that were equipped with so-called defeat devices — software intended to mask excess emissions by cranking up pollution controls whenever a car was being tested on rollers in a lab.
Several others have been accused of concocting excuses for the excess emissions and trying to prevent regulators from discovering the truth. Volkswagen also admitted that its employees destroyed emails and other evidence in 2015 as it became clear that regulators would soon learn of the illegal software.
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