One of the problems here is that a lot of the time, the worst thing that happens to an individual from the company is just that they get fired. That's just not a very strong deterrent when the upside if you don't get caught is potentially huge raises/promotions/bonuses.
Imagine if the worst thing that could happen to you when robbing banks if you get caught is just that you can't rob banks in that area anymore. That's kind of how this works for individuals in corporations.
The supply chain is long but it's supposed to have exceptionally detailed documentation. Follow that document trail and start prosecuting people when those documents start turning sour, because not documenting the work properly is a crime in itself.
This won't be sufficient to fix Boeing, but it would be a start.
Change the law so that design flaws arising from a culture/system that deprioritizes safety are considered criminally negligent for upper management (at least for safety critical domains like aircraft or cars).
Then you just have to prove that they intentionally deprioritized safety/engineering in their systems and culture.
Stonecipher was CEO nearly 20 years ago. Are you proposing to put someone in jail for crimes which happened over a decade after he left the company. Someone which has certainly ZERO knowledge of anything related to the MAX?
Absolutely. If he made systemic changes to the company (and those are proveable) that focused on profit over security he belongs in jail, no matter how long it took for the murder to take effect.
He lead an airplane maker, not a coffee shop. Focusing on profit the way Boeing did was planning a murder and trying to reap the profit in the meantime. All the participating management belongs in a court room.
One of the problems here is that a lot of the time, the worst thing that happens to an individual from the company is just that they get fired. That's just not a very strong deterrent when the upside if you don't get caught is potentially huge raises/promotions/bonuses.
Imagine if the worst thing that could happen to you when robbing banks if you get caught is just that you can't rob banks in that area anymore. That's kind of how this works for individuals in corporations.