DoJ Says Boeing Faces Criminal Charge for Violating Deal Over 737 Max Crashes
Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:
The US Department of Justice yesterday said it has determined that Boeing violated a 2021 agreement spurred by two fatal crashes and is now facing a potential criminal prosecution.
Boeing violated the agreement "by failing to design, implement, and enforce a compliance and ethics program to prevent and detect violations of the US fraud laws throughout its operations," the DOJ said in a filing in US District Court for the Northern District of Texas. Because of this, "Boeing is subject to prosecution by the United States for any federal criminal violation of which the United States has knowledge," the DOJ said.
The US government is still determining whether to initiate a prosecution and said it will make a decision by July 7. Under terms of the 2021 agreement, Boeing has 30 days to respond to the government's notice.
[...] "We believe that we have honored the terms of that agreement and look forward to the opportunity to respond to the Department on this issue," Boeing said. "As we do so, we will engage with the Department with the utmost transparency, as we have throughout the entire term of the agreement, including in response to their questions following the Alaska Airlines 1282 accident."
Yesterday's DOJ court filing said that Boeing could be prosecuted for the charge listed in the one-count criminal information that was filed at the same time as the deferred prosecution agreement in 2021. That document alleged that Boeing defrauded the Federal Aviation Administration in connection with the agency's evaluation of the Boeing 737 Max. The DOJ filing yesterday said Boeing could also be prosecuted for other offenses.
In January 2021, the DOJ announced that Boeing signed the deferred prosecution agreement "to resolve a criminal charge related to a conspiracy to defraud the Federal Aviation Administration's Aircraft Evaluation Group (FAA AEG) in connection with the FAA AEG's evaluation of Boeing's 737 Max airplane."
This occurred after 346 passengers died in two Boeing 737 Max crashes in 2018 and 2019 in Indonesia and Ethiopia. Boeing agreed to pay $2.5 billion, including $1.77 billion in compensation for airline customers and $500 million for the heirs, relatives, and legal beneficiaries of the crash victims.
[...] The nonprofit Foundation for Aviation Safety, which is led by former Boeing employee Ed Pierson, recently accused Boeing of violating the deferred prosecution agreement. Pierson alleged in a December 2023 court filing that "Boeing has deliberately provided false, incomplete, and misleading information to the FAA, the flying public, airline customers, regulators, and investors."
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