Family of Irishman who died in Boeing crash condemn US 'sweetheart plea deal'

Micheál (Mick) Ryan, an engineer with the United Nations’ World Food Programme, was posthumously named the Humanitarian of the Year by the Irish Red Cross.

The family of Irishman Mick Ryan, who died in a Boeing 737 MAX crash along with 156 others, has vigorously condemned the US government which looks set to offer the global plane maker another “sweetheart plea deal”.

The terms of a new deal, which include a fine, three years’ probation, and independent safety audits, were outlined during a briefing call with the US Department of Justice on Sunday night.

“Words cannot express how devastating this plea deal is for our family and for all the victims’ families,” Mick Ryan’s wife, Naoise Connolly Ryan, and his mother, Christine Ryan, said in a joint statement.

They accused the US Department of Justice of gaslighting them over the last three and a half years. They said: 

They first told us we were not crime victims and we had no rights. We fought them in court and we won.

Ever since Mick Ryan, deputy chief engineer at the UN World Food Programme, was killed in March 2019, his family has been looking for justice. But his widow and mother say their efforts have been blocked every step of the way, not only by Boeing but by those at the US justice department.

“They now tell us that the 346 lives lost — in two fatal crashes six month apart — are not relevant to this case and therefore there is no accountability for their deaths,” they told the Irish Examiner.

They call all of this ‘justice’. This is not justice, this is just an extension of the secret sweetheart deal that Boeing got in 2021 under the Trump administration. 

Under that deal, known as a deferred prosecution agreement, Boeing was exempted from criminal charges as long as it fulfilled its commitment to safety. However, it was found to be in breach of that agreement after a narrowly averted disaster last January when a door plug on an Air Alaska 737 MAX blew out mid-air.

In May, relatives said they had renewed hope when the US justice department found Boeing had breached the deal. It informed the company that it could face criminal charges.

After Sunday night’s briefing call with the department, however, Naoise Connolly Ryan said it was clear that Boeing would, again, be let off the hook: 

This is an attempt by Biden’s Department of Justice to whitewash what was a blatant miscarriage of justice in the first place and to wash their hands of any wrongdoing. 

"But we will not give up on our fight for justice,”  she said. 

Boeing has until Friday to accept the deal and plead guilty, or face criminal charges.

Meanwhile, Erin Applebaum, a US attorney who represents 34 families who lost loved ones on Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302, said relatives “vigorously opposed 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 recognise the dignity of the 346 people murdered by Boeing’s negligence,” Applebaum said.

UN World Food Programme worker Mick Ryan died in a Boeing crash along with 156 others in March 2019. His wife Naoise Connolly Ryan and mother, Christine Ryan, say the US has effectively extended a sweetheart deal brokered under the Trump administration.

“When there is inevitably another Boeing crash and the Department of Justice seeks to assign blame, they will have nowhere else to look but in the mirror,” she said.

There was no comment from Boeing or the US Department of Justice.

A Department of Foreign Affairs spokesperson said Tánaiste Michéal Martin had engaged with the US Government on a number of occasions to request that the rights of victims be upheld and that full accountability is demonstrated, most recently last month.

"The Tánaiste continues to monitor the latest developments in this legal case," the spokesperson said.