Why a guilty plea didn't shield a former labor relations VP from answering in civil court
GM can keep suing Stellantis and a former labor relations VP over an alleged decade-long bribery scheme, a Michigan appeals court has ruled.
In a decision issued May 11, 2026, the Michigan Court of Appeals affirmed trial court rulings that let General Motors press state tort claims against FCA US, Stellantis, and Alphons Iacobelli, FCA's former Vice President of Labor Relations, in Wayne Circuit Court. The panel rejected arguments that the case belongs at the National Labor Relations Board, and upheld orders forcing Iacobelli to answer deposition questions he had tried to refuse on Fifth Amendment and spousal privilege grounds.
GM accuses FCA of running a "systemic and near decade-long conspiracy to bribe certain senior union officials, corrupt the collective-bargaining process, and weaken plaintiff General Motors to the point that it would agree to merge with FCA." It says FCA bought labor concessions denied to GM and cost GM billions.
Iacobelli sits at the center of the case. According to the decision, he was FCA's Vice President of Labor Relations from 2008 to mid-2015 and Director of the UAW-Chrysler National Training Center, and there is "no dispute" he was at the center of a federal corruption investigation that led to charges against 15 people tied to FCA or the UAW. He pleaded guilty in federal court to conspiracy to violate the Labor Management Relations Act and to filing a false tax return. His plea acknowledged that FCA used the training center's bank and credit card accounts to channel money and gifts to UAW officers, including roughly $1.5 million in prohibited payments meant to win FCA "benefits, concessions, and advantages" in collective bargaining.
For HR leaders and labor relations heads, three pieces of the ruling stand out.
NLRA preemption did not hold. FCA argued that GM's claims really attack bargaining conduct and therefore belong before the NLRB. The appeals court disagreed. GM, the judges said, is not suing on behalf of employees over unfair labor practices. It is suing as a competitor for fraud, unfair competition, and breach of fiduciary duty. The court also pointed to a "local interest" exception, noting the case involves "the interrelations between two of the three Detroit-based automakers, where billions of dollars in damages are at stake." The signal for employers: bribery and fraud aimed at a competitor through the bargaining table can be fought in state court, not only at the NLRB.
The Fifth Amendment did not bail Iacobelli out either. He invoked it nearly 500 times in his deposition. The appeals court agreed he had to answer. It cited "selective waiver" – once he testified voluntarily about topics like his purchase of a 2013 Ferrari tied to training center funds, or his post-termination communications with former FCA president Sergio Marchionne, he could not refuse the follow-ups. The court also found the statute of limitations had run on most of the conduct, leaving no "real danger" of fresh charges. A guilty plea plus expired limitations periods, the panel concluded, can leave a former executive with little Fifth Amendment cover in civil discovery.
Spousal privilege failed too. Iacobelli refused 20 deposition questions, and his wife Susanne, who is not a party, refused to produce handwritten notes of conversations with him. The court ruled Michigan's privilege protects testimony "for or against" a spouse who is actually a party to the case, and Susanne is not. It also held that producing documents is not being "examined" as a sworn witness, and the federal "act of production" doctrine under the Fifth Amendment does not stretch to cover Michigan spousal privilege.
The decision keeps GM's tort claims alive in Wayne County. It does not resolve whether FCA actually orchestrated the scheme GM describes, or whether Iacobelli and former UAW Vice President Joseph Ashton infiltrated GM the way GM alleges. FCA and Stellantis have denied that Iacobelli acted on FCA's behalf after leaving the company and have argued the suit was really aimed at disrupting a then-pending merger with Peugeot.
