Boeing avoided a trial by agreeing to pay $2.5 billion (£1.8 billion) after admitting that faulty systems were to blame for the crashes.
Now, surviving family members are petitioning to restart the settlement.
They will be facing off against the aerospace behemoth in court soon.
The judge in the case decided that people murdered in the planes were “crime victims” and should have been consulted in compensation discussions, making this hearing the first time Boeing has been publicly called to answer to the fraud claim.
The “sweetheart arrangement” Boeing and the Department of Justice (DoJ) made in 2021 to settle a criminal conspiracy allegation, according to the families of the victims, was an affront to their rights and allowed Boeing to dodge full accountability.
Because the Department of Justice could not establish beyond a reasonable doubt that Boeing’s alleged offences were directly responsible for the two disasters, it has defended its judgement and insisted that the settlement was justified.
Boeing, which accepted blame as part of the settlement, has voiced opposition to revisiting the accord, arguing that doing so would be “unusual, impractical, and inequitable.” The company did not provide any response in advance of the Texas hearing on Thursday.
Father Mark Pegram was unable to make the trip to Texas after learning that his son Sam had perished in the second plane tragedy while working for a refugee agency. However, he emphasised his satisfaction with the upcoming hearing.
An apology and a fine do not constitute justice in his eyes.
He said, “A precedent must be set to prevent similar loss of innocent life, and for Boeing to comprehend the awful impact their malfeasance has had on so many families.”
The families have urged the judge to appoint an impartial monitor to keep an eye on Boeing’s compliance with the arrangement and to make the company’s compliance efforts public in a court filing this week.
It is unclear at this time whether or not the litigation will result in the reopening of the deferred prosecution agreement between Boeing and the Department of Justice.
A drastic change like that is quite uncommon. The families are being represented in a separate legal lawsuit by Chicago attorney Robert A. Clifford, who claims that the ruling might have far-reaching ramifications, including action against people.
He said that the families wanted “the highest punishment levied against Boeing” and that “any immunity from prosecution that top executives at Boeing got” should be revoked.
Inquiring minds want to know: What went wrong with the Boeing 737 Max?
Nearly four years have passed since the accident of Ethiopian Airlines Flight ET302 from Addis Ababa to Nairobi, which occurred just minutes after takeoff. In March 2019, it crashed into farmland outside of Ethiopia’s capital, killing 157 people.
A brand-new kind of aeroplane, the 737 Max, was involved in the crash.
Lion Air, an Indonesian airline, lost control of a nearly identical plane just months earlier on a journey that was supposed to be a normal one from Jakarta to Pangkal Pinang and instead fell into the Java Sea. There were a total of 189 fatalities on board, including both passengers and staff.
Later investigation revealed that similar flight control software, called MCAS, was a contributing factor in both incidents.
The technology was intended to let 737 pilots who are used to flying older models of the plane go to the skies without having to undergo costly additional training.
However, sensor failures led it to malfunction, and in both cases, the pilots were helpless as the plane plunged to its destruction.
American inquiries found that Boeing had tried to minimise the significance of the MCAS system in its interactions with the Federal Aviation Administration and had not included information about the technology in pilot manuals or training advice.
On December 29, 2020, American Airlines Flight 718 takes off from Miami, Florida, United States, as the first commercial Boeing 737 MAX flight since authorities lifted a 20-month suspension in November.
After being grounded in March 2019, the 737 Max was given the green light to resume flights in 2020.
After being grounded in 2019 due to the crashes, the Boeing 737 Max aircraft will be authorised to fly again in the United States in 2020 and the United Kingdom and the European Union in 2021.
The United States filed fraud charges against Boeing in January 2021. The trial may have been avoided if the corporation hadn’t paid $2.5 billion (including $500 million to the relatives of the deceased) and pledged to improve its compliance measures.
The Department of Justice (DoJ) has agreed to withdraw the allegation after three years if the company abides by the conditions of the settlement.
Many of the families of the victims on board ET302 were outraged by the terms of this settlement, which is called a deferred prosecution agreement.
The arraignment hearing itself is a significant event for families, especially those in the United Kingdom.
After losing her father, Joseph Wathaika, in the ET302 disaster, Zipporah Kuria became an outspoken advocate for holding Boeing accountable for the tragedy.
She’ll be testifying in Texas, and she believes her testimony will be a homage to an “amazing” guy who improved the lives of countless people.
She felt like “we’re finally being seen,” she remarked. The deaths of our loved ones, those 346 people, now seem to matter.
