General Motors will pay $900m (€795m) to settle a criminal probe on its failure to recall cars with faulty ignitions linked to at least 124 deaths, US officials have announced.
The largest US automaker agreed to a deferred prosecution agreement to settle the probe, which investigated why GM took no action to recall millions of cars despite knowing about the defect for more than a decade.
The US government charged GM with wire fraud, in addition to concealing the defect to regulators.
The government agreed not to seek a conviction in exchange for the penalty and the appointment of an independent monitor at the company.
"GM admits that it failed to disclose to its US regulator and the public a potentially lethal safety defect that caused airbag non-deployment in certain GM model cars, and that GM further affirmatively misled consumers about the safety of GM cars afflicted by the defect," prosecutors said in a letter to Anton Valukas, who conducted an internal investigation of the case for GM.
GM began recalling some 2.6m cars worldwide in February 2014 after years of avoiding acknowledgement of the dangerous problem.
The defective switches can cause the ignition to unintentionally switch out of the "on" position, disabling airbags and other functions while the car continues to run.
The defect has been linked to 124 confirmed fatalities and about 275 serious injuries.
