Boeing Pleads Guilty To Fraud In 737 Max Crash; To Pay $243 Million Fine (image-X/BoeingAirplanes)
Boeing has agreed to plead guilty to a criminal conspiracy charge after the US Justice Department determined that the planemaker had violated an earlier settlement linked to two 737 MAX fatal crashes.
The company faces a hefty criminal fine of nearly $243.6 million. Boeing paid the same amount under the 2021 settlement that it breached, the Justice Department said.
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Boeing received a choice of either entering a guilty plea and paying the fine as part of its sentence or facing a criminal trial on the felony charges of conspiracy to defraud the US.
The two 737 MAX crashes in Indonesia and Ethiopia in 2018 and 2019 killed over 346 people. The incident led to the families of the victims demanding the planemaker firm face prosecution.
However, the plea deal, which still requires a federal judge’s approval to come into effect, covers the crashes and does not give the American aerospace giant immunity from other incidents, including a recent panel that blew off a Max jetliner during an Alaska Airlines flight in January. Except for the company, it also does not cover current or former Boeing officials.
The guilty plea will brand Boeing a convicted felon and threaten the firm’s ability to secure future government deals with the country’s Defence Department and NASA and its status as a federal contractor. The company was exposed to criminal prosecution after it violated a 2021 settlement linked to the two crashes.
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Federal prosecutors accused Boeing of committing a conspiracy to defraud the US government by misleading regulators regarding a flight control system and pilot-training requirements that were implicated in the 737 MAX crashes.
In January 2021, the Justice Department said that Boeing would not be prosecuted on the charge if the American firm complied with conditions set by the government for three years. However, last month, the prosecutors alleged that Boeing had breached the terms of the agreement.
