Grandparent scam: London, Ont., senior beats fraudsters not once, but twice
It was a typical Tuesday for Mabel Beharrell, 84, until she got the call that would turn her world upside down. Her teenaged grandson was in trouble and needed her help.
Families of passengers who died in the crash of a Boeing 737 Max in Ethiopia can seek damages for the pain and terror suffered by victims in the minutes before the plane flew nose-down into the ground, a federal judge has ruled.
The ruling means that lawyers for the families will be able to call experts to testify about the victims' pain and suffering before the 2019 crash, which killed everyone on board.
The ruling posted late Tuesday by U.S. District Judge Jorge Alonso in Chicago is a setback for Boeing, which had argued that evidence about the victims' suffering would be speculative.
The decision comes in a case over compensation for the relatives of people who died in the second of two deadly crashes involving Boeing's best-selling plane. A trial is scheduled to begin June 20.
Boeing has admitted responsibility for the deaths of the passengers and agreed not to blame the pilots or anyone else. In exchange, lawyers for the families agreed not to seek punitive damages against the company. The trial will determine compensation for things such as burial expenses, loss of income, and grief suffered by immediate family members.
At a hearing last week, Boeing lawyers sought to block testimony about pain and suffering by passengers in the minutes before the crash. They said the testimony would be inflammatory and have an unfair impact on jurors.
Boeing lawyers also said that Illinois law - in effect even though the case is being tried in federal court - bars compensatory damages for the passengers' pain and suffering because they died the instant the plane hit the ground.
Attorneys for the families say their clients can't stop thinking about the terror their loved ones suffered as the plane repeatedly dove and climbed before entering a final nosedive at nearly 700 miles (1126 km) per hour. The attorneys want to call experts who would testify that the passengers likely suffered physical injuries and emotional trauma before the crash.
There are bound to be further arguments over rules of the trial, including whether to call the crash an accident. One of the families' lawyers, Robert Clifford, said he wants to call the crater left by the crash a crime scene. Clifford said this week's ruling will help families receive compensation for pain suffered by relatives “who needlessly died at the hands of a company that put profits over safety.”
Asked for comment on the ruling, a Boeing spokeswoman referred to a previous statement in which Boeing said it was sorry for all who lost loved ones in the two crashes. The company said it has kept a commitment to settle “to fully and fairly compensate every family who suffered a loss” by settling most of the claims, and will continue negotiating over the remaining claims.
In 2021, Boeing reached a settlement with the Justice Department to avoid criminal prosecution for misleading federal regulators who approved the Max by hiding details of a flight-control system implicated in the crashes. The company received a $244 million fine and agreed to pay compensation to airlines and victims, raising the cost of the deal to $2.5 billion.
In all, 346 people died in the two crashes involving Max jets shortly after airlines around the world began using the planes. In October 2018, a Lion Air Max crashed in Indonesia, killing all 189 people on board. Less than five months later, in March 2019, an Ethiopian Airlines Max carrying 149 passengers and eight crew members crashed six minutes after takeoff from Addis Ababa.
Boeing has settled with most families of people on board the Lion Air jet and many of those on the Ethiopian plane, but lawyers say about 75 cases remain open, and six will be included in the upcoming trial in federal court in Chicago.
Boeing is headquartered in Arlington, Virginia, but it was based in Chicago when the first lawsuits were filed in 2019.
It was a typical Tuesday for Mabel Beharrell, 84, until she got the call that would turn her world upside down. Her teenaged grandson was in trouble and needed her help.
The deaths of four people on a farm near the Saskatchewan village of Neudorf have been confirmed a murder-suicide.
Genetic analysis has shed light on a long-standing mystery surrounding the fates of U.S. President George Washington's younger brother Samuel and his kin.
Former U.S. President Donald Trump is officially selling a copy of the Bible themed to Lee Greenwood’s famous song, 'God Bless the USA.' But the concept of a Bible covered in the American flag has raised concern among religious circles.
The Parole Board of Canada has granted full parole to one of three men convicted in the brutal murders of three McDonald's restaurant workers in Cape Breton more than 30 years ago.
Rainfall warnings of up to 90 millimetres and other alerts have been issued for six Canadian provinces, according to the latest forecasts.
Ontario released its annual sunshine list Thursday afternoon, noting that the largest year-over-year increases were in hospitals, municipalities, and post-secondary sectors.
A bus carrying worshippers headed to an Easter festival plunged off a bridge on a mountain pass and burst into flames in South Africa on Thursday, killing at least 45 people, authorities said.
Calgary police have shut down a number of bridges into and out of the downtown core as officers deal with a distraught individual.
B.C. conservation officers recently seized a nine-foot-long Burmese python from a home in Chilliwack.
A New Brunswicker will go to bed Thursday night much richer than he was Wednesday after collecting on a winning lottery ticket he let sit on his bedroom dresser for nearly a year.
The Ontario government is introducing changes to auto-insurance, but some experts say the move is ill-advised.
A Toronto restaurant introduced a surprising new rule that reduced the cost of a meal and raised the salaries of staff.
Newfoundland’s unique version of the Pine Marten has grown out of its threatened designation.
A Toronto man is out $12,000 after falling victim to a deepfake cryptocurrency scam that appeared to involve Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
It started small with a little pop tab collection to simply raise some money for charity and help someone — but it didn’t take long for word to get out that 10-year-old Jace Weber from Mildmay, Ont. was quickly building up a large supply of aluminum pop tabs.
There’s a group of people in Saskatoon that proudly call themselves dumpster divers, and they’re turning the city’s trash into treasure.
Ontario is facing a larger than anticipated deficit but the Doug Ford government still plans to balance its books before the next provincial election.