The Department of Justice wants Boeing to plead guilty to a fraud charge linked to two fatal crashes involving the company’s 737 Max jetliners, lawyers representing the families of crash victims told media outlets on Sunday.
The charge stems from a 2021 settlement after the company was accused of conspiring to defraud the Federal Aviation Administration. The deal protected Boeing from prosecution linked to a pair of crashes involving 737 Max planes in 2018 and 2019, killing a combined 346 people. But the DOJ found in May that the company broke the terms of the settlement, and the agency has considered bringing criminal charges.
If Boeing accepts the offer, that would avoid a public trial at a time when the company is still reeling from a series of major incidents, including when a panel blew off a plane operated by Alaska Airlines in January.
Boeing officials have maintained the company “honored” the terms of the settlement and disagreed with prosecutors’ findings.
Reuters was the first to report on the DOJ’s offer.
Federal officials shared terms of a potential plea with families on a call on Sunday before taking the offer to Boeing executives. The terms would include Boeing pleading guilty to the fraud charge and accepting a $244 million fine. The company would be subject to oversight from an external monitor for three years and the company’s board would be required to meet with victims’ families, a lawyer on the call told The New York Times.
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The families on the call were not happy with the proposal, The Associated Press reports, noting they want Boeing to face a criminal trial and pay a mammoth $24.8 billion fine.
“We are upset. They should just prosecute,” Nadia Milleron, whose daughter, Samya Stumo, died in one of the crashes, told the AP. “This is just a reworking of letting Boeing off the hook.”
Paul Cassell, a lawyer representing about a dozen families, said his clients would “strenuously object” to the terms, adding to the Times the victims’ memory “demands more justice than this.” The attorney added he believed the offer was a “sweetheart deal” for the aerospace giant.
The plea offer comes just ahead of a July 7 deadline for the DOJ to file criminal charges in the case. Boeing is expected to have until the end of this week to accept or reject the terms.
If the company refuses, prosecutors have said they will take the case to trial.