[jrockway]

Yeah, so they're really just getting punished for not dotting their is and crossing their ts. They could create a subsidiary with the same board of directors as Ford that they sell the cars to, and then the subsidiary does the dirty work of repurposing the cars from passenger vehicles to cargo vehicles. They skipped paying the $100 corporate registration fee, so now they're on the hook for a billion dollar fine that would have been legal if they added another company to the mix? Give me a break.

[brewdad]

Except that now those vehicles are used and may be more difficult to sell again. If you don't go through the trouble of retitling them, then clearly they were never really sold and the courts will see right through this scheme.

[gowld]

You are arguing that because it is possible to break the law and escape on a technicality, the law is invalid in all cases.

[nybble41]

If they "escaped on a technicality" then they weren't breaking the law. That "technicality" is part of the law.

The indefensible part is tying a large difference in import tariffs to how many seats are installed. Absurd outcomes such as this one highlight systematic flaws in the rules. If the basis for the tariffs were logically sound you wouldn't be able to work around them without addressing the reason the tariffs were imposed in the first place.

[lazide]

Probably not - that kind of setup gets seen through by judges all the time.

The phrase you’re looking for is ‘criminal conspiracy’

[philjohn]

No, they're being punished for evading duty with a loophole, aware that it's a loophole.