The embezzlement charges didn't seem to make much sense when I took a look. Taken literally, sure, maybe he embezzled. But this is a guy who basically set his own salary at whatever number he wanted every year for 20 years. And apparently there was a culture at the top of the company where the executives were able to spend quite freely using company money. If you are able to simply legally pay yourself more if you want to, the only reason you wouldn't is that you are under the impression you can simply use company money for personal use anyway. What's the difference, really? It's almost just an accounting issue; clarification for investors.

I read the articles a long time ago so I may be off by a bit but I recall that when I did the math Carlos Ghosn had a personal net worth of at least ~$115 million _at the time he was accused of embezzling just a few million dollars._ It's like a millionaire stealing $20,000. Certainly possible, but more likely to be some sort of misunderstanding given the circumstances.

I don't expect this to be a popular comment. But the charges never made much sense to me. And normally in cases of corporate embezzlement there isn't such a compelling alternate narrative/conspiracy to explain what happened.