Boeing must pay $35.8 million to the family of Shikha Garg, one of the 157 people killed when a 737 MAX crashed in Ethiopia more than six years ago, a Chicago jury ruled Wednesday

The jury verdict is the first reached in a slew of lawsuits filed against Boeing after two deadly MAX crashes in 2018 and 2019. Those who lost loved ones accused Boeing of manufacturing an unreasonably dangerous and defective aircraft, and claimed the company was negligent, according to attorneys representing the victims’ families.

Investigators now know that the two crashes — killing 189 people in Indonesia in October 2018 and 157 people in Ethiopia four months later — were caused by flawed flight control software on the then-new jet.

Boeing has admitted responsibility for the crashes in the lawsuits, which are being tried in the U.S. District Court in Chicago, where Boeing used to be headquartered. Attorneys for both parties have spent the years following the crashes negotiating settlements to determine compensation for the families of each victim. Less than a dozen cases remain.

The lawsuits that have been resolved all settled before reaching trial, in some cases, less than a day before trial was set to begin. The details of those settlements are confidential.

On Nov. 3, Garg’s case became the first to go to trial. A little more than a week later, the jury awarded $28.4 million to Garg’s estate, plus additional prejudgement interest.

Garg, a United Nations environmental worker, was 32 when she died. She was flying from Ethiopia to Nairobi, Kenya, when the Boeing 737 MAX 8 crashed just six minutes after takeoff. She had married three months before.

“We wanted the jury to understand what was lost,” said Shanin Specter, an attorney with Kline & Specter who was part of the team representing Garg’s estate. “That she was a bright light at the United Nations and in the environmental sciences field. And that the U.N. and the world has lost a lot from the premature passing of this brilliant, 32-year-old scientist.”

Specter said he and his client felt it was important for one of the lawsuits against Boeing to go to trial so that “the facts of what occurred during that flight” would be publicly discussed and Boeing would be held publicly accountable.

Specter said his team brought four witnesses and Boeing brought one to discuss what passengers may have experienced during the final minutes and seconds of the flight.

“There was general agreement from experts that the last 2 1/2 minutes were extraordinarily rough, with the last 25 seconds of that being a dive to the Earth, which of course was terrifying for everyone on board,” Specter said.

A spokesperson for Boeing said the company is “deeply sorry” to those who lost loved ones in the two deadly crashes in Indonesia and Ethiopia.

“While we have resolved the vast majority of these claims through settlements, families are also entitled to pursue their claims through damages trials in court, and we respect their right to do so,” the Boeing spokesperson said.

In addition to the lawsuits, Boeing faced a criminal fraud charge stemming from the deadly crashes. But, while the civil trial was ongoing, a federal judge in Texas approved a deal to dismiss the charge.

Federal prosecutors charged Boeing in 2021 with criminal fraud following accusations that the manufacturer misled safety regulators about a new software system on the 737 MAX.

U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor ruled this month that the Department of Justice and Boeing could move forward with a nonprosecution agreement, which would drop the criminal fraud charge while imposing $1.1 billion in fines, victims’ compensation and compliance requirements on the company.

O’Connor warned that he agreed with objections from the victims’ families that the deal wouldn’t ensure the safety of the flying public. But, O’Connor continued, the law did not support the court denying the motion to drop the criminal charge just because it disagreed with the government.

The families who lost loved ones in the fatal crashes said they plan to appeal O’Connor’s ruling.

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