Families livid over proposed Boeing deal that avoids criminal charges in 346 deaths

The Justice Department has reached a deal with Boeing that will allow the airplane giant

to avoid criminal prosecution

for allegedly misleading U.S. regulators about the 737 Max jetliner before two of the planes crashed and killed 346 people, according to court papers filed Friday.

Under the “agreement in principle,” which still needs to be finalized, Boeing would pay or invest more than $1.1 billion, including an additional $445 million for the crash victims’ families, the Justice Department said.

In return, the department has agreed to dismiss the fraud charge against Boeing, allowing the manufacturer to avoid a

possible criminal conviction

that could have jeopardized the company’s status as a federal contractor, according to experts.

The settlement was disclosed in a federal court filing Friday, just weeks before a trial was set to start June 23 in Fort Worth, Texas. It calls for the company to strengthen quality and safety measures, Justice Department lawyers said.

It’s a stunning turnaround in the long-running legal case. Just last year, Boeing agreed to plead guilty to a criminal conspiracy. But that deal was rejected in December by U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor, who has been overseeing the case since 2021.

The new agreement — reached over strong objections from some victims’ families — still needs to be approved by O’Connor.

After the government submitted notice of the agreement, lawyers representing family members of crash victims told O’Connor they plan to object to the deal and urge him to deny any attempt by the government to dismiss the criminal case against Boeing.

“The families intend to argue that the dismissal unfairly makes concessions to Boeing that other criminal defendants would never receive and fails to hold Boeing accountable for the deaths of 346 persons,” they said in a court filing.

Many of the families opposed any deal that allowed Boeing to avoid criminal prosecution. They’ve fought for years to extract harsher penalties from the company. Both crashes were linked to a flawed flight control system on 737 Max jets. The only Boeing official to face trial was a mid-level manager overseeing the pilot manuals and training materials. He was acquitted.

Catherine Berthet, whose 28-year-old daughter Camille Geoffrey was killed in the 2019 crash, said she was “absolutely stunned” by the proposed agreement.

“I will never get rid of my pain and my tears,” Berthet said in a statement. “By deciding not to prosecute Boeing and not to take it to court, the government is sending a message to the public that big companies are above the law and justice, even when they kill.”

The government said a final agreement will be filed by the end of next week, but provided an overview of the terms in its filing. Among them: a $243.6 million fine for Boeing and a order for the planemaker’s board of directors to meet with family members of people killed in the crashes.

The tentative agreement would allow require Boeing to contribute $444.5 million to a fund for families of victims killed in the crashes of Lion Air Flight 610 in October 2018 and Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 in March 2019, according to the filing. Boeing also would spend $455 million to strengthen its compliance, safety and quality programs, the filing shows.

“Ultimately, in applying the facts, the law, and Department policy, we are confident that this resolution is the most just outcome with practical benefits,” prosecutors said in a statement, noting that they’d “met extensively” with relatives of the victims.

Not all of the victims’ families are opposed to the deal, according to prosecutors.

In Friday’s filing, the Justice Department said family members and lawyers representing more than 100 crash victims either expressed support for the resolution, efforts to end the case before trial or did not oppose the agreement. One family member told the government he wants “the DOJ to find a way to resolve this matter as soon as possible.”

Boeing declined to comment on the deal. The company’s shares fell less than 1% on Friday.

The case has taken several turns. In 2021, Boeing reached an agreement with the Justice Department to defer prosecution on charges that it deceived regulators about the system. Under that deal, Boeing paid a $243.6 million fine. In early 2024, two days before the charge would’ve been dismissed, a door-sized plug blew out of an airborne 737 Max. While no one was killed, the accident led to investigations and findings of lax controls in Boeing’s factories.

–Bloomberg News and The Associated Press contributed

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