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Boeing to plead guilty to criminal fraud charge stemming from 737 MAX crashes

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Re: Boeing to plead guilty to criminal fraud charge stemming from 737 MAX crashes

#381
post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The problem is that finding the people responsible can be extremely hard > What Boeing really needs is a complete change in management culture Who is ultimately responsible for management at a company though? The CEO and the other C-level people. This isn't really the daunting difficult problem you make it out to be: the buck stops at the C-suite. Who else could possibly be ultimately responsible??

Boards run corporations on behalf of investors through vague and soft guidance so as not to directly be considered officers CEOs are appointed based on their ability to do what the board wants while shielding the board - this is why they get paid the most Until investors and the board significantly hurt, to the point where their investment is either a total loss, or they are liable for additional financial inputs the…

Ok but are you arguing for or against holding CEOs liable?

If that big CEO paycheck came with some actual risks if you ignored ethics then maybe there would be fewer CEOs willing to do that.

Re: Boeing to plead guilty to criminal fraud charge stemming from 737 MAX crashes

#382

Seems an extremely soft ball approach: • Under the deal, Boeing agreed to pay a $243.6 million fine and for an third-party monitor to be installed to monitor the company’s compliance. ~$240M seems pretty low for an industry where billions are commonly thrown about. • The deal spares Boeing from a trial just as the planemaker is trying to turn a corner in its safety and manufacturing crises. Sparing them from a trial…

For spilling a hot coffee cup you get $ 2.7 million worth of punitive damages. But for killing more than 200 people and trying to hide the evidence, we'll charge you 200 million and call it a day. That's less per person than the price of a hot-coffee spill.

[flagged]

Re: Boeing to plead guilty to criminal fraud charge stemming from 737 MAX crashes

#383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> technically as president/CEO of a firm you are already liable for any criminal conduct by your firm/employees-on-the-job. Citation needed. Limited liability is at the foundation of the very concept of incorporation.

The intention is to limit the liability of investors, not those in control of the company.

Agreed, the key phrase here is _limited_ liability not immunity.

I am still trying to figure out how Boeing got around their commercial insurance companies? There is a bag of vipers also waiting for their turn with the CEO for sure... =3

Re: Boeing to plead guilty to criminal fraud charge stemming from 737 MAX crashes

#384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For spilling a hot coffee cup you get $ 2.7 million worth of punitive damages. What's the context here?

A woman spilled McDonald's coffee on herself, fusing her labia together and receiving third-degree burns. She needed skin grafts. McDonald's knew that their coffee was dangerously hot and had been repeatedly warned about it, so the jury awarded punitive damages.

FYI their coffee is still just as hot, but they changed their cups.

Re: Boeing to plead guilty to criminal fraud charge stemming from 737 MAX crashes

#385

Seems an extremely soft ball approach: • Under the deal, Boeing agreed to pay a $243.6 million fine and for an third-party monitor to be installed to monitor the company’s compliance. ~$240M seems pretty low for an industry where billions are commonly thrown about. • The deal spares Boeing from a trial just as the planemaker is trying to turn a corner in its safety and manufacturing crises. Sparing them from a trial…

It's even softer when you dig into the details. > third-party monitor For just three years. Lawyers for the victims said yesterday Boeing would select the monitor the DOJ would appoint. I hope this is no longer the case but can't find confirmation. If so, it's insane. Self-certification was a major source of corruption and rot in Boring. https://www.newsweek.com/boeing-pleads-guilty-fraud-sweethea...

Weren't they already obligated to do this as part of a previous plea deal and it didn't do anything to prevent this case?

When you or I commit a crime during probation that was the same type of crime that lead to probation in the first place, we get a much much harsher sentence the second time around. For boeing, it seems this plea deal would just be "probation a second time"

Re: Boeing to plead guilty to criminal fraud charge stemming from 737 MAX crashes

#386

From the article: Paul Cassell, a lawyer for victims’ family members, said he plans to ask the federal judge on the case to reject the deal and “simply set the matter for a public trial, so that all the facts surrounding the case will be aired in a fair and open forum before a jury.” Hard to disagree

> Hard to disagree But hard to agree too. How exactly can you prevent someone from pleading guilty?

The judge is allowed to reject the plea deal. At which point the defendant can either withdraw their guilty plea and try their luck with a jury - or maintain it and accept whatever sentence the judge wants to impose-which could potentially be a lot harsher than what was agreed in the plea deal.

Unlikely relevant to this case, but judges are legally required to reject guilty pleas if they conclude that the defendant is being coerced, doesn’t understand what they are pleading to and the likely consequences of their plea, lacks competence to plea (due to severe mental illness/etc), or that the plea lacks a “factual basis” (e.g. if the conduct alleged by the prosecution and admitted by the defendant fails to legally constitute the elements of the crime; or if the judge has good reason to believe that the conduct in question never actually happened despite both prosecution and defence agreeing that it did)

On the last point-the prosecution is allowed to offer the defendant a plea deal for a lesser included offense, but not an unrelated crime that doesn’t correspond with what they are accused of doing-e.g. you can plead drug charges down to lesser drug charges, but you can’t plead drug charges down to possession of stolen goods if there is no evidence anything was actually stolen-in such a scenario the judge is supposed to reject the guilty plea

Re: Boeing to plead guilty to criminal fraud charge stemming from 737 MAX crashes

#387

From the article: Paul Cassell, a lawyer for victims’ family members, said he plans to ask the federal judge on the case to reject the deal and “simply set the matter for a public trial, so that all the facts surrounding the case will be aired in a fair and open forum before a jury.” Hard to disagree

If it does go to trial it would be great for people behind this to be directly tried for their criminal actions as well. The reality is that a company is on trial for the actions of individuals and if there is no follow through on that it will not change anything. I doubt it goes to trial as I am 99% sure that the judge will rubber stamp the whole thing because the US is a corporate driven hellscape where peasants ar…

95% of US inmates are on plea deal, which means the prosecutor never had to prove the charges before the (potentially) criminal admitted it. It is unfair for those who admitted the charges because they believed they couldn’t defend themselves further.

So the Boeing trial being on plea deal would be on paar with that standard…

Re: Boeing to plead guilty to criminal fraud charge stemming from 737 MAX crashes

#388

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Think he means certain banks. Think JP Morgan, Citi, that kind of bank, rather than banks as a whole.

You’re describing a GSIB. There are only 4-6 banks in the US that’s considered a GSIB

8 (1). And I think that, in this context, those 8 plus the 22 US D-SIBs (2) means that there's 30.

FWIW, I _think_ I'm not just pedantically correcting a particular number. I think I'm asserting that keeping track of n organizations is roughly O(n^2), so it's not 4 times as much work to keep track of them all, but more like 56 times as much work. I think that's a real difference that requires a different approach.

I get that _you're_ not saying anything re: approach, just terminology. But I think the number matters to this subthread.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_systemically_important... 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_systemically_important...

Re: Boeing to plead guilty to criminal fraud charge stemming from 737 MAX crashes

#390

From the article: Paul Cassell, a lawyer for victims’ family members, said he plans to ask the federal judge on the case to reject the deal and “simply set the matter for a public trial, so that all the facts surrounding the case will be aired in a fair and open forum before a jury.” Hard to disagree

> Hard to disagree But hard to agree too. How exactly can you prevent someone from pleading guilty?

You don’t. But the judge can reject the plea deal that’s leading to the guilty plea.

Boeing isn’t pleading guilty in a vacuum - there’s a deal in place. Judge can reject that now, wait until after guilty plea and impose whatever sentence he wants (within law), or accept the deal as-is.

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