Relatives of the 346 people killed in the crashes of two Boeing 737 Max planes in Indonesia and Ethiopia are representatives of crime victims under federal law, a United States federal court has ruled.
According to the judge, the relatives ought to have been involved in the private negotiations over settlement arrangements.
It has emerged that Boeing had been in secret talks with the U.S government without involving families of the victims of the two gruesome accidents. Consequently, according to the judge, the court will soon determine what remedies the families of victims should receive for being excluded from the talks.
The first Boeing Max 737 crashed in Indonesia in October 2018, killing 189, and another crashed five months later in Ethiopia, killing 157 people.
All Boeing 737 Max jets were grounded worldwide for nearly two years. Strangely, they were cleared to fly again after Boeing overhauled an automated flight-control system that activated erroneously in both crashes.
In January 2021, U.S government entered into an agreement with Boeing effectively compromising the administration of justice against the criminal action for which the US-based company was involved.
In a cold rebuttal, the U.S Justice Department said it did not inform families about the secret negotiations with the company because they were not the actual crime victims.
However, Reed O’Connor, a U.S District Judge, argued in his ruling on Friday that the crashes were a foreseeable consequence of Boeing’s conspiracy, making the relatives representatives of crime victims.
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“In sum, but for Boeing’s criminal conspiracy to defraud the FAA, 346 people would not have lost their lives in the crashes,” he wrote.
Investigations revealed that the company misguided safety regulators who approved the Max 737, leading to the deaths of 346 passengers within a period of six months. The company later agreed to pay $2.5bn including a $243.6m fine to the families of the victims.
“Had Boeing not committed its crime” pilots in Ethiopia and Indonesia would have “received training adequate to respond to the MCAS activation that occurred on both aircrafts”, O’Connor ruled.
“It is a tremendous victory which sets the stage for a pivotal hearing, where we will present proposed remedies that will allow criminal prosecution to hold Boeing fully accountable,” Paul Cassell, one of the lawyers representing the families of the victims, said shortly after the ruling.