The article does not make that obvious -- it only mentions that Liang was an executive in the third-to-last paragraph, after referring to him as a "former engin

The article does not make that obvious -- it only mentions that Liang was an executive in the third-to-last paragraph, after referring to him as a "former engineer". It's also possible that Liang was an engineer at the time of the crime, and then was moved to an executive position: > Liang is still employed by Volkswagen but no longer works as an engineer.