Boeing crashes: Passengers' families deemed crime victims

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) — A federal judge ruled Friday that relatives of people killed in the crashes of two Boeing737 Max planes are crime victims under federal law and should have been told about private negotiations over a settlement that spared Boeing from criminal prosecution

The full impact of the ruling is still not known. The next step is to come up with remedies for the families who weren't told of the talks with Boeing.

Some relatives want to scrap the government's January 2021 settlement with Boeing because they don't like the fact that no one has been held criminally responsible.

Boeing did not reply to a request for comment.

The company will pay a fine of $243.6 million for misleading safety regulators who approved the Max. The company won't be prosecuted for conspiracy to cheat the government.

The relatives of crime victims are not crime victims, according to the justice department. The judge in Fort Worth, Texas said that the crashes were a result of Boeing's conspiracy.

343 people would not have died in the crashes if Boeing had not been involved.

The wife of a man who died in the second Max crash blamed Boeing.

She said in a statement issued by a lawyer for the families that their views should have been taken into account before the government agreed to a sweetheart deal with Boeing.

In Indonesia and Ethiopia, the first and second Max crashed within five months of each other. The Max jets were out of commission for over two years. After Boeing changed the automated flight-control system, they were allowed to fly again.