It's called "Faling on your sword".

The idea that VW would come out of this with no executives going to prison is laughable. They broke black-letter law. It wasn't just recklessness. There is no plausible deniability. They straight-up cheated. They knew they cheated. Management endorsed the cheating. When the initial investigation got going they lied about cheating.

My guess is a number of execs will plead guilty before this is all over.