Ben,

Here’s the thing, the criminal charges in this case were made against the corporation itself, not individual executives.

Criminal charges against a corporate entity almost never result in penalties other than fines even thought there are a couple of other options. Jailing executives would require filing charges against the individual executives.

So from that perspective, it’s a plea bargain not a bribe or blackmail.

Criminal charges against individual corporate employees would require proving that they knew (or in the case of criminal negligence should have known) that the ignition switch was too flimsy. They probably don’t have any evidence that would let them go after anyone higher up than the head of GM’s design engineering team.

:. Q.E.D.