Boeing might be criminally prosecuted for 737 MAX crashes after all, says DoJ Boeing avoided prosecution for a pair of 737 Max crashes thanks to a 2021 agreement with the Department of Justice, but the DoJ says the jetmaker has since violated the order and can be prosecuted. The DoJ accused Boeing of failing to uphold its end of the deferred prosecution agreement (DPA) in a letter [PDF] to US District …
It was completely immoral to let Boeing buy its way out of criminal prosecution (how many of us are able to do that?) in the first place. The company made grave errors to increase its profits to please shareholders and executives. Almost 350 people lost their lives because of this. The FAA and U.S. politics are rotten to the core that they allowed this.
It's entirely subjective whether the company held to its agreement terms. I'm absolutely certain did implement some part of the "compliance and ethics program to prevent and detect violations of the U.S. fraud laws throughout its operations."
The problem with American "justice" is that the corporation will be charged criminally, as is their belief of "corporations are people".
But actual living, breathing people in the C-suite will almost assuredly get off, scot-free. As usual.
But at 'least' they'll get to walk away with their golden parachutes.
It's the same everywhere (not just in America). We had revolutions to get rid of monarchs that were obscenely rich, all-powerful, and immune to lawful punishment (American Revolution, French Revolution, Haitian Revolution, Soviet Revolution, Chinese Revolution, ...), and little by little new small groups of folks managed to make themselves obscenely rich, all-powerful, and immune to lawful punishment again. Revolutions need steady maintenance to keep rolling ...
Well, not everywhere...
"In enacting the Health and Safety at Work Act in 2015, Parliament’s “express intention” was to promote accountability of officers in senior leadership positions – “especially those at a distance from day-to-day operational and safety decision-making because of their seniority”.
The prosecutors drew on Australian research which found that corporate officers responsible for worker safety should be exposed to a “meaningful personal risk of regulatory action”.
Personal liability, backed by credible enforcement, was “the single most important motivator of CEOs”."
I can see something like that going to the Supreme Court (is NZ's Supreme Court still the UK Supreme Court?) with an argument that someone "at a distance from day-to-day operational and safety decision-making because of their seniority” cannot possibly be in a position to prevent an unauthorised action in the course of a day-to-day operation if that was the cause of the accident.
Ahh, but there’s no reason other than “tradition” that they cannot begin to take an immediate and active hands-on role. Got time for a two-hour lunch after 4 or 5 meetings where you sit? Then you have time for a 90 minute hands on safety inspection and related training, and the same 30 minute lunch as the plebs. Doing that once a week shouldn’t be a problem when they are able to benefit from it directly.
It's not about being present and able to personally prevent the accident; it's about forcing corporations that work with safety hazards to implement functional safety policies and systems so that the circumstances that led to the accident could not occur in the first place.
Holding decision-makers personally liable certainly sharpens their decision-making...
It's not about "preventing an unauthorised action". Of course there will always be people breaking the rules for a zillion reasons.
What a CEO should do, however, is to ensure that (1) the rules exist in the first place, (1a) properly documented and maintained, (2) they are correctly conveyed (by training) and (3) appropriately enforced (by lower management).
That's what it's alleged Gibson didn't - that he 'failed to exercise reasonable “care, diligence, and skill” or take all practicable steps to minimise or eliminate critical risks'.
I can hope that I can manage to talk the authorities into this very point today, as I attempt to get charges pressed. But, so far, no one has cared to listen.
But thank you very much for that quote, I'll try to remember to use it during today's discussion .
> Unfortunately, revolutions are messy, and either extremists or cynical and power-hungry manipulators tend to end up on top.
In any revolution there is the danger you might actually win. My solution being to reintroduce the Ancient Roman tradition of all high positions being elected for a fixed period. And after that they must retire from public life. Else we'd end-up with Bob at the State Department moving to R******* moving to V******* moving to B******** and then moving back to the State Department.
My friend / boss suggested the same almost 30 years ago. 'Do your (public) service...then leave. Go back to farming, like George Washington did'.
Problem is that politician is now a "career" rather than simply a (current) job description. As my current boss notes, only in politics do you spend millions of dollars to gain employment in a job that (supposedly) pays ~$140k/year. Strange how that works o_O
Wow
American culture has really brainwashed you into believing the founders were noble people who did their duty and not because of greed or personal gain.
GW was an aresehole, he didnt free his slaves during his lifetime because again personal greed. Jefferson with all his elequance and big talk, another areshole who raped his slaves so much for theirfreedom. Yes todays politiians do it for money but please dont pretend the american founding fathers were any better, because they too would be in jail for their slavery crimes if they were alive today.
If we're going back to the Classical Greco-Roman period, that's not the only reform I'd like to see. Most of Plato's Republic is kinda out there, but I do agree with the idea of the leaders having strict limits on certain forms of property while in power. One of the few remaining bipartisan institutions is rampant insider trading[1] and cushy jobs/consultancies in the private sector after leaving office. Forced divestment for the legislator AND their spouse[2], and a blackout period for such private sector work after leaving office would put a significant dent in the widespread corruption. They're supposed to serve the public and not themselves, after all. And to that end, I wouldn't even object to them all getting a comfortable increase in salary that would be paid in full during the blackout period.
[1] And no real enforcement.
[2] If the spouse doesn't agree, then congresscritter doesn't get to serve.
This is the whole pointed of limited liability companies/corporations and there are good reasons for it. There are also, at least in many jurisdictions, exceptions to the liability for members of management. See the recentish trials in Germany against members of VW's management.
What is unusual in the US is the ability to deals to avoid prosecution. Again, there are reasons for this, specifically to avoid the courts filling up even more, but there are also egregious deals, especially those that absolve those concerned of any kind of liability. And, again, that makes some sense given US tort law and the principle of unlimited liability in such suits. Some suggestions for America: reform tort law and use the stick of liability in such deals to give them teeth. I can't help thinking that if Calhoun and co. really did face the prospect of at least civil suits, they might reconsider some of their business decisions.
Not fair to class George III as 'all-powerful', he was a constitutional monarch by the standards of the time. BTW his personal views are on record as being in favour of Abolition. The American Revolution was inevitable as a large developed polity wanting to govern itself, not geographically remotely.
More to the point, George III (like every monarch since Charles II a century earlier) remembered the fate of Charles I when he fell foul of Parliament*.
It's one of the really good aspects of the UK constitution, the politico actually wielding executive power can be removed on demand because it is Parliament as a body that’s in charge not a single individual.
*James II & VII got off lightly after trying his luck with absolutism.
George III memory. has nothing to do with it. He literally did not have any powers regarding the drafting and legislation process.
He had no choice in the matter from the start. The monarch can only sign laws into effect or refuse to sign, but they cannot edit them in anyway.
You are making assumptions that the americans wanted to be ruled more locally, but ignoring other british policies that the english wanted to enforce that the american rich peple didt like.. The british wanted to honour and limit white person expansion, that was a major cause that is overlooked. the american founding fathers were not honourtable men, remember they all had slaves so their freedom talk was hypocrisy. The revolution was simply a grab for power so they could make laws to their own personal advantage, and they largely won because of british pribles w/ franch in europe.
Corporations are not "people" they are classed as a "legal person".
That means that they can sign contracts, enter into other agreements and be sued. What you cannot do with a "legal person" is send them to prison or execute them. That is something that only a "natural person" can be subjected to.
I agree with posters above, those executives controlling the company when it breaks the law should be prosecuted and either fined or if necessary imprisoned. I prefer prison time as these characters will just get the company to pay any fine and then leave via a golden parachute.
Should executives be personally punished?
The prosecution would need to prove they intentionally compromised their product and knowingly had a disregard for safety with criminal intent. On the other hand they could be incompetent and unable to resolve the problem - but that is not a prosecutable crime. While there may be cries for a vendetta, don't forget this will set a precedent for other situations. Microsoft Windows crashed at the 911 call center and the fire trucks could not be dispatched in time = jail time for Nadella (at minimum an investigation and/or lawsuit). This becomes a slippery slope.
Should Boeing be fined in to oblivion?
That puts over 170,000 people out of work, along with all the businesses that support Boeing. While the legitimacy and accuracy of our elections are certainly questionable, that many people is a big block of voters the government doesn't want to piss off. Any financial penalty big enough to cause layoffs is risky to political careers, lots of unions involved and they stick together.
I am not advocating that nothing should be done. I am just pointing out it isn't going to be easy to come out with a good resolution that doesn't cause unintended consequences.
The prosecution would need to prove they intentionally compromised their product and knowingly had a disregard for safety with criminal intent
Not quite.
A few hats ago I worked for a UK company that was US owned. As our finances fed into their reports, that meant we were caught up with Sarbanes-Oxley which was brought in after the likes of Enron and WorldCom were caught well and truly cooking the books. The essence is that board level people had to sign off on accounts, and actually sign to state "these are accurate". Then, should it turn out that the accounts weren't accurate, whoever signed to say they were would be in the smelly stuff - possible jail time.
That doesn't mean that they have to look at all the figures, all the way down to us. But what it does mean is that they need to have policies and procedures in place such that they can be confident that what they are signing is actually correct - so proper controls, with oversight by way of things like proper audits, all the way down.
There's no reason not to have a system like that for product safety. The CEO doesn't have to physically go down on the production line and check that every bolt is correctly fitted. But before he signs off on the safety reports, he does need to have confidence that a) there are processes in place to ensure that the bolt is fitted, and b) that there are processes in place so that if anyone tried to fudge the system, then it will be spotted. From what's being reported, it would seem that Boing were lacking in both a and b, and that senior management both knew about it and condoned it (or even encouraged it).
Once you have a situation where someone senior must sign off on something, and if it goes pear shaped then they can find themselves in jail, then they have a serious incentive to make sure that whatever they are signing off is actually true - unless they can employ a PLEASE person, which I don't think would work in reality.
ICould: The essence is that board level people had to sign off on accounts, and actually sign to state "these are accurate". Then, should it turn out that the accounts weren't accurate, whoever signed to say they were would be in the smelly stuff - possible jail time.
cow: they should be libable . They want the big bucks so they can pretend their signature is valuable, then they should make due effort to verify wha tthey sign, and effort i mean spend more than a day or two pretending to have a meeting.
Icould: The CEO doesn't have to physically go down on the production line and check that every bolt is correctly fitted. But before he signs off on the safety reports, he does need to have confidence that a) there are processes in place to ensure that the bolt is fitted, and b) that there are processes in place so that if anyone tried to fudge the system, then it will be spotted
Cow: If the CEO has installed a system where there is not suffficient quality review process, then they should be criminal liable for not trying to do the right thing. If someone makes a human mistake and forgets to connect a wire etc thats bad luck and not managements fault. If cut back quality and bad stuff continues to happen, and then one more time its fatal etc, then they should be liabvle because they failed in their duty to ensure satefy.
Marty: The prosecution would need to prove they intentionally compromised their product and knowingly had a disregard for safety with criminal intent
cow: Boeing executives when they make their speaches constantly take credit for everything at B. THey are admitting to being responsible for *MAJOR* decisions. It is on public record that B executives selected the IDEA of MCAS and they also made the decision TO NOT TELL ANY of the customers of their plane and ALSO DECIDED not to make any public notice to the pilots.
Your example of windows crashing is not a delibrate act, nobody can claim that MS delibrately went out of their way to cause those crashes.
Wow another moron who wNTS to protect ceos, because well they obviously care for Marty.
Marty i have news for you, basically every single ceo in america, wouldnt piss on you if you were on fire, and you can be sure they would fire you if you worked for them if they could bullshit their way to another bonus and you care for their wellbeing.
Talk about brainwashed.
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