2000 White Mitsubishi Mirage, 38k Miles. No Rust, Good Engine. on 2040-cars

Auto blog

Japan prosecutors seek 2 years in prison for ex-Nissan exec Greg Kelly

TOKYO — Japanese prosecutors demanded two years in prison for former Nissan executive Greg Kelly and accused him of joining a “conspiracy” to pay his former boss Carlos Ghosn illicitly in closing arguments Wednesday in a yearlong trial. “That unpaid compensation existed is clear,” prosecutor Yukio Kawasaki told the Tokyo District Court, reading briskly from a thick document. Kelly, a 30-year veteran at the Japanese automaker, was living in the U.S. when he was arrested in November 2018 upon returning to Japan to attend a meeting. The first American to be appointed to NissanÂ’s board, Kelly says he is innocent. He sat calmly in the courtroom, wearing his usual red tie and dark suit, alongside defense lawyers. Everyone in the courthouse was wearing a mask because of the pandemic. Kelly told The Associated Press in an interview last month he did not know all the details of GhosnÂ’s pay. He was determined to retain Ghosn, Nissan's former chairman, because of his extraordinary management skills and wanted to pay him in a legal way, he said. Ghosn was arrested at the same time as Kelly and also maintains he is innocent. He skipped bail in late 2019 and fled to Lebanon, the country of his ancestry. It has no extradition treaty with Japan. The charges center around a pay cut of about 1 billion yen ($10 million) a year that Ghosn voluntarily started taking from 2010, halving his pay after disclosure of high executive pay became mandatory in Japan. Nissan Motor officials considered various ways to make up for the money Ghosn gave up, such as paying him consulting fees after retirement. They also mulled other methods such as payments through subsidiaries and stock options. Nothing had been paid at the time of the arrests. The contention is over whether that money should have been reported as compensation as a de facto promised sum under a binding contract, or didnÂ’t need to be disclosed until it was finalized. Ghosn has said a group at Nissan engineered his arrest because they feared that French automaker Renault, which owns 43% of Nissan, would gain more control over the company. Other Nissan officials made similar comments during KellyÂ’s trial. Renault sent Ghosn to Nissan in 1999 to lead its rescue from the brink of bankruptcy. He successfully steered the maker of the Leaf electric car and Infiniti luxury models for nearly two decades.

Carlos Ghosn video: 'This is about conspiracy. This is about backstabbing'

TOKYO — Nissan's former Chairman Carlos Ghosn maintained his innocence in a video released by his legal team Tuesday and accused some executives at the Japanese automaker of a "conspiracy" that led to his arrest on financial misconduct allegations. "The first message is that I'm innocent," said Ghosn, wearing a white shirt and dark jacket and speaking calmly in the nearly 10-minute video shown at the Foreign Correspondents' Club in Tokyo. "This is a conspiracy," he said. "This is not about specific events, this is not about, again, greed, this is not about dictatorship. This is about a plot. This is about conspiracy. This is about backstabbing." His lawyer Junichiro Hironaka said the video was prepared in case Ghosn was not able to speak at a news conference planned for Thursday. Ghosn was arrested last week while out on bail and remains at the Tokyo Detention Center. Ghosn said the executives behind the conspiracy were motivated by what he called "selfish fears," including what they saw as a merger with French alliance partner Renault SA. They mistook his leadership for greed and dictatorship, when he was the biggest defender of Nissan's autonomy, Ghosn said. He also said he was worried about Nissan, wondering whether those executives were really watching out for the company. Hironaka said a section of the video in which Ghosn mentioned names was removed on his legal advice. Nissan Motor Co., while declining to comment on the criminal case, has said an internal investigation has found that Ghosn falsified financial documents to under-report compensation, and that he used Nissan money for personal gain. "Nissan's internal investigation has uncovered substantial evidence of blatantly unethical conduct," company spokesman Nicholas Maxfield said when asked for comment on Ghosn's video. "The company's focus remains on addressing weaknesses in governance that enabled this misconduct." Ghosn's fourth arrest was on a fresh breach of trust allegation based on suspicion that payments from a Nissan subsidiary to an Oman dealership were diverted to a company effectively run by Ghosn. On Monday, Nissan Motor Co. shareholders voted to oust Ghosn from its board and to approve the appointment of French alliance partner Renault SA's Chairman Jean-Dominique Senard as Ghosn's replacement. Renault owns 43 percent of Nissan.

2018 Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV First Drive | Nailing the sweet spot

SANTA CATALINA ISLAND, Calif. — For years now, while the Mitsubishi brand has languished here in the U.S., other parts of the world have been enjoying the Outlander PHEV. It's Europe's best-selling plug-in hybrid, and Mitsubishi has been improving on it over the years, testing it, refining the technology and punishing the vehicle in competitions like the Baja Portalegre 500 and the Asia Cross Country Rally. Now, as electric vehicles begin to gain greater acceptance, and as Mitsu turns its brand around, it will finally offer the Outlander PHEV in America at the end of this year. As Mitsubishi prepares to launch the Outlander PHEV stateside, we had the rare opportunity to drive it across the interior of Santa Catalina Island, off the coast of Los Angeles, to test it out on some rugged, scenic roads. Sitting inside the Outlander PHEV, we were actually pleased with the interior. It was simple and clean, and the plastics didn't feel especially cheap. Sure, it wasn't the thoughtful design or plush touch points of the other available plug-in crossovers on the market, but the Outlander PHEV also doesn't share the same price tag. We definitely found it to be more attractive and appealing than the inside of, say, a Chevrolet Equinox. If you were expecting a pile of hot garbage from Mitsubishi, you're way off. When we popped open the rear liftgate to take a look, we found our near-ideal tailgating vehicle. In the rear cargo area was a ton of space, a large speaker, cupholders and a standard three-prong outlet, perfect for plugging in a slow cooker, blender, or any other appliance you could find useful at a football game or campsite. Later, when we would take a break from our drive at Catalina Island's Shark Harbor, we'd be treated to a smoothie prepared in a blender plugged into that AC outlet. If you happen to use all 12 kWh of energy, the gas engine will fire up to serve as a generator. The Toyota 4Runner may have had the "Party Mode" button, but the Outlander PHEV would be our pick for the stadium parking lot. As we passed through a gate at the edge of the town of Avalon and headed up a dirt road across the interior of Catalina Island, we were quickly impressed with the way the Outlander PHEV handled the rocky, dusty trails from which most drivers are normally prohibited. The steering feel was light but communicative, and we were really able to tell what was going on between the front wheels and the rugged surface beneath them.