The news comes after another report that the company would not be charged
The finality of Boeing $BA’s legal fate regarding its 2021 deferred prosecution agreement with the Justice Department remains unclear. Reuters reports that prosecutors who have been investigating the company will recommend that it face criminal charges. The news comes after the New York Times reported Friday that the Justice Department was going to instead offer Boeing another deferred prosecution agreement.
Justice officials have until July 7 to decide whether they’ll actually charge Boeing according to their original deal struck four years ago, after two Boeing 737 Max 8 planes crashed and killed more than 300 people in part due to autopilot controls that were not properly explained. The government had been pursuing a fraud prosecution but instead extracted a $2.5 billion fine and put the company on probation as long as it tightened up its safety and manufacturing processes.
But when a door plug blew out mid-flight on a Boeing 737 Max 9 plane in January, scrutiny returned to that 2021 deal, and there has been siginificant pressure to begin criminal proceedings. When outgoing Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun testified before the Senate last week, Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said he thought there was “overwhelming evidence” that the plea agreement had been violated and that he thought “prosecution should be pursued” because the door plug blowout suggested Boeing had not been making the internal reforms it had promised were coming.
“The Department of Justice’s unwillingness to enforce the law is barely a surprise at this point, and the 737 Max families have lost all faith that the Department will ever truly hold Boeing to account for its crimes,” one group of the Max 8 plane crash victims’ families said in respond to the Times report on Friday.
Although the ultimate decision on what to do with Boeing does not lie with Justice Department prosecutors, a recommendation to move forward with charges would line up with the agency’s previous insistence that the company had in fact violated its 2021 deal. Neither the Justice Department nor Boeing immediately replied to a request for comment.
Join 500,000+ readers who start their day with Quartz.
By subscribing, you agree to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.
