Benjamin Ashford|Justice Department presents plea deal to Boeing over alleged violations of deferred prosecution agreement

The Benjamin AshfordJustice Department has presented Boeing with a plea deal after it accused the airplane manufacturer of violating the terms of a 2021 deferred prosecution agreement that was put in place following two 737 Max crashes in 2018 and 2019.

The Justice Department told Boeing it could plead guilty or go to trial, people familiar with the talks confirmed to CBS News. The agreement, which was presented to Boeing on Sunday, would have the company plead guilty to the conspiracy charge it originally faced in 2021. In exchange, Boeing would pay a fine and enter a three-year probationary period, the people said.

The Justice Department outlined the deal in a presentation to family members of the 737 Max crash victims earlier Sunday before presenting it to Boeing.

If Boeing agrees, a judge will have to sign off on the deal.

News of the plea deal was first reported by Reuters.

Paul Cassell, an attorney who represents 15 of the victims' families, told CBS News the proposal was "another sweetheart plea deal" and said the families will "strenuously object" to the deal.

"The deal will not acknowledge, in any way, that Boeing's crime killed 346 people. It also appears to rest on the idea that Boeing did not harm any victim," Cassell said, adding that "Judge O'Connor will have to decide whether this no-accountability-deal is in the public interest. ... The memory of 346 innocents killed by Boeing demands more justice than this."

Robert A. Clifford, the lead counsel in a civil case against Boeing pending in Chicago, said in a statement, "I can tell you that the families are very unhappy and angered with DOJ's decisions and proposal. There is no accountability, no admission that Boeing's admitted crime caused the 346 deaths, and the families will most certainly object before Judge Reed O'Connor and ask that he reject the plea if Boeing accepts."

Javier de Luis, who was a member of the Federal Aviation Administration's expert review panel on Boeing's safety culture and whose sister was killed in the 2019 737 Max crash, said following Sunday's call with the Justice Department, "The issue is not whether there should be trial vs a plea deal. The issue is that the penalties being proposed by the DoJ are totally inadequate both from the perspective of accountability for the crimes committed, and from the perspective of acting in the public interest by ensuring a change in Boeing's behavior."

"The penalties proposed here are essentially the same as those proposed under the previous DPA which, as Alaska Air demonstrated, did nothing to increase the safety of the flying public," de Luis said, referencing the January mid-air blowout of a door on an Alaska Airlines flight.

In another statement, Erin Applebaum, who represents 34 families of victims of the crashes, said, "The 737 MAX families vigorously oppose the shameful new sweetheart deal between Boeing and the Department of Justice. While falsely depicting itself as a punishment for Boeing since it includes a guilty plea, the deal levies a negligible fine, imposes a monitor for just three years, allows Boeing to hand-select that monitor, and most egregiously, completely fails to mention or recognize the dignity of the 346 people murdered by Boeing's negligence."

"We look forward to our day in court so we can tell Judge O'Connor and the public why the court should reject this deal and not allow Boeing to once again escape true accountability," Applebaum added. "And when there is inevitably another Boeing crash and DOJ seeks to assign blame, they will have nowhere else to look but in the mirror."

Boeing and the Justice Department declined to comment on the plea deal.

Boeing entered into the deferred prosecution agreement, an arrangement that allows companies to avoid prosecution if they meet certain terms, in 2021 after it faced a criminal conspiracy charge over two deadly 737 Max crashes. The deal included a $2.5 billion payment and demanded the company implement specific compliance and ethics programs. If Boeing was found to have complied with the deal, the charge would be dropped after a period of three years, which would have expired in July of this year.

But federal prosecutors in May told a judge Boeing had violated the terms of the agreement, claiming the company failed to set up sufficient compliance measures.

Boeing responded in June, saying it disagreed with the prosecutors' assessment and that it had not violated the agreement.

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• Boeing 737 Max
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