A federal judge on Thursday ordered Boeing Co. to appear in court on Jan. 26 to be arraigned on a 2021 felony charge after families of those killed in two fatal crashes objected to a 2021 plea deal.
Boeing won immunity from criminal prosecution as part its $2.5 billion January 2021 Justice Department deferred prosecution agreement over a 737 MAX fraud conspiracy charge related to the plane’s flawed design.
The families argued that the Justice Department “lied and violated their rights through a secret process,” and asked U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor to rescind Boeing’s immunity from criminal prosecution.
O’Connor, of the Northern District of Texas, in Fort Worth, ruled in October that people killed in two Boeing 737 MAX crashes are legally considered “crime victims,” and family members had urged him to require Boeing to be legally arraigned on the felony charge….