North Carolina Shop Fined $10M for Selling Diesel Emissions Defeat Devices Between 2014 and mid-2019, the shop produced and sold over 250,000 devices designed to remove or disable emissions controls.
A North Carolina performance shop has agreed to pay $10 million in fines and penalties for manufacturing, selling, and installing devices intended to disable or remove emissions control systems on diesel vehicles.
Rudy Performance Parts and its owner, Aaron Rudolf, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to violate the Clean Air Act in a criminal case. They were fined $2.4 million and sentenced to three years of organizational probation. Prosecutors found Rudolf had tampered with emissions monitoring devices on around 300 diesel trucks. He also received a personal criminal fine of $600,000. But this is just the beginning.
In a separate civil suit filed on behalf of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) by the U.S. Justice Department, it was revealed that for many years, Rudy Performance Parts had been selling defeat devices to pickup truck owners. Rudolf had been selling delete devices that tampered with the ODB systems of trucks. These devices, known as the Mini Maxx, were manufactured by another company and also offered available along with the XRT Pro defeat device, produced by the same firm, referred to as Company A in the suit.
After Company A ceased operations and stopped producing defeat devices, Rudy Performance Parts conspired with others to create counterfeit versions. Between July 2015 and December 2016, a software technician was hired to modify existing tuners into imitation defeat devices. Rudy Performance Parts later manufactured these devices in-house, having spent $850,000 on a laptop with specialized software to replicate Company A’s products. From December 2016 to July 2018, the shop reportedly sold around 43,900 imitation tuners, generating $33 million in revenue.
The civil lawsuit alleges that from at least 2014 to mid-2019, Rudy Performance Parts and its owner manufactured and sold over 250,000 products designed to remove or disable emissions controls. These products included software-based devices, plates to block exhaust gas recirculation systems, and pipes to replace pollution control components in the exhaust system.
Under a consent decree filed on July 29, Rudy Performance Parts and Rudolf will pay a $7 million civil penalty. The EPA estimates that the shop’s products contributed pollution equivalent to that of over 1 million additional vehicles on America’s roads.
