Boeing Co. and U.S. prosecutors said they’re working to hammer out a new deal to settle a criminal case stemming from two fatal 737 Max crashes after a federal judge blocked an earlier plan because it included race as a consideration for selecting a compliance monitor.
The Justice Department is working with Boeing “to include revisions to the proposed plea agreement that would address the reasons the Court rejected it,” lawyers for the agency’s fraud section and the company told the judge Friday in a filing.
Last month, U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor rejected a previous plan because it called for an independent monitor to be selected in accordance with the department’s diversity and inclusion criteria. He also said the plan would diminish his role in ensuring Boeing’s compliance with the deal.
“The parties have not reached agreement and do not expect to before January 4th, but are continuing to work in good faith toward that end,” the Justice Department wrote in a separate letter to the families of crash victims that was reviewed by Bloomberg News.
The Justice Department met with some family members of the 346 people killed in the crashes after the judge’s ruling in December, according to the letter. The relatives have said they urged the government to seek a more aggressive deal to hold Boeing accountable for the deaths, or to consider taking the case to trial.
In its letter, the department stressed that there’s no guarantee that a revised deal will be reached.
Family members of crash victims have fought for years to get harsher penalties following the crashes of Lion Air Flight 610 in October 2018 and Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 in March 2019. Both fatal accidents were linked to a flawed flight-control system.
In 2021, Boeing reached an agreement with the Justice Department to defer prosecution on charges that it deceived regulators about the system. In May, the government said the company violated that agreement and recommended criminal charges, citing Boeing’s failure to live up to its promises. Boeing and the department finalized the first proposed plea deal based on those charges in July.
