FILE - Protesters hold the photographs of victims, including Melvin Riffel, left, of the Ethiopian Airlines plane crash, outside Boeing’s annual shareholders meeting in Chicago on April 29, 2019. Ike Riffel , a California father whose two sons died in the 2019 crash, fears that instead of putting Boeing on trial, the government will offer the company another shot at corporate probation through a legal document called a deferred prosecution agreement, or DPA.
“The families want to know the truth. Who was responsible? Who did what?” the father says. “Why did they have to die?” In early 2019, Mel and his wife, Brittney, took a “babymoon” to Australia. Brittney flew home while Mel met his brother in Taiwan to start what they called their world tour. He and Bennett were headed toward their last stop, South Africa, where Mel planned to do some surfing, when they boarded the Ethiopian Airlines flight in Addis Ababa.
He and his wife believe they were deceived by the Justice Department, which until then had denied there was a criminal investigation going on. Boeing has never contacted the family, according to Riffel. He assumes that’s based on advice from the company’s lawyers.