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US aviation giant Boeing has faced renewed scrutiny in a Chicago federal civil court, where lawyers for the family of a victim of the 2019 Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 crash accused the aircraft manufacturer of negligence over the deadly crash that killed 157 people.
The case centres on the death of 24-year-old Samya Stumo, an American public health worker who died when the Boeing 737 MAX 8 crashed shortly after takeoff from Addis Ababa on March 10, 2019.
Speaking before the court on Wednesday, lawyer Shanin Specter said the tragedy could have been avoided.
“Boeing was negligent, Boeing’s aircraft was unsafe, Boeing caused this crash and these deaths,” Specter told jurors. “This crash was preventable, this crash was senseless.”
The disaster led to 155 civil lawsuits filed by victims’ relatives. Most were settled outside court, but the Stumo family failed to reach an agreement with Boeing before the trial began earlier this week.
Samya’s father, Michael Stumo, gave emotional testimony about the impact of her death on the family. He described his daughter as “sophisticated and charismatic” and recalled the moment he learned about the crash.
“It felt like my organs were crushing inside my body,” he said.
Stumo also spoke about the lasting emotional toll on the family, saying happiness had become difficult since her death.
“It feels like since she’s been gone we don’t have permission to be happy,” he testified.
According to court proceedings, Samya Stumo had been travelling for her first assignment with a public health NGO, which her family described as her dream job. Specter told the jury she had taught herself to read at the age of three, graduated high school at 16, and later earned a scholarship to the University of Copenhagen.
The Ethiopian Airlines disaster came months after the Lion Air Flight 610 crash in Indonesia. Together, both crashes claimed 346 lives and triggered a worldwide grounding of Boeing’s 737 MAX aircraft.
Boeing has acknowledged that anti-stall flight software played a role in both accidents.
Representing the company, attorney Dan Webb expressed sympathy for the Stumo family and said Boeing agreed they deserved “significant financial compensation.”
“The only disagreement we have is, we do disagree on the exact amount of compensation,” Webb told the court.
The trial is expected to continue until May 15 unless both parties reach an out-of-court settlement before then.
