Judge Rejects Bid to Nullify Boeing Deal Over Max Crashes

DALLAS—A federal judge has rejected an effort by families of passengers who died in Boeing Boeing’s 737 Max crashes to reopen an arrangement that prevented it from being charged with fraud in its acquisition of regulatory approval.

District Judge Reed O’Connor in Fort Worth said that he has sympathy for families of the 346 people who died in two Max crashes, but that federal law doesn’t give courts the power to oversee agreements that prosecutors make with defendants.

The court, O’Connor wrote in a decision dated Thursday, “has no occasion to address whether the [settlement] is in fact grossly incommensurate with Boeing’s egregious criminal conduct.”

The ruling ends a family effort by passengers’ relatives to cancel a January 2021 agreement between Boeing and the Justice Department. Boeing agreed As part of a $2.5B settlement, Boeing agreed to pay a $244m fine. This was in return for not prosecuting Boeing on a felony Fraud charge.

Paul Cassell, a lawyer representing the families, stated that they intend to appeal the ruling to U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. Circuit Court of Appeals.

“Boeing and DOJ crafted an illegal and secret plea deal without any chance for the families to confer about it, which is required by the Crime Victims Rights Act,” Cassell stated this in a prepared declaration. “We are optimistic our appeal will vindicate the families’ rights in this case and ensure that never again are deals like this one reached secretly and without victim involvement.”

Boeing didn’t immediately respond to our request for comment.

O’Connor ruled in October that the families met the definition of crime victims and the Justice Department should have told them about the negotiations. This led to O’Connor ordering Boeing to stand for his arraignment.

Boeing and the Justice Department agreed that the judge should not open the settlement again.

At the Jan. 26 hearing, Boeing pleaded not guilty to fraud, and more than a dozen family members gave emotional testimony about their grief and outrage at Boeing’s actions. Many called for the prosecution of Boeing executives.

Boeing was accused of misleading the Federal Aviation Administration regarding a critical flight-control system on Max that was involved in 2018 crashes in Indonesia and 2019 crashes in Ethiopia. Boeing blamed two former test pilots. However, critics stated that low-ranking employees were the ones being held responsible for corporate wrongdoing.

After the crash and the worldwide grounding, Max sales stopped. Orders have rebounded more recently, however, and the Max is Boeing’s best-selling plane. Because of the strong demand, Boeing announced last month that it would open a fourth Max assembly plant in the second half of next year.

By David Koenig