Boeing Allows Unprecedented Judgment of Liability to be Entered in Alaska air Crash; Trial set to Begin on Damages

Chicago-based Boeing entered into a stipulation of liability today (Tuesday, June 3) in the January 2000 crash that killed 88 people aboard Alaska Airlines Flight 261, allowing a federal judge to enter an unprecedented judgment of liability against the corporate giant. Alaska Airlines also admitted liability in court today.

These admissions of liability come on the eve of trial following three years of depositions by the plaintiffs which exposed problems with the horizontal stabilizer of the MD-80 aircraft.

The companies filed court documents with U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer in San Francisco. The National Transportation Safety Board concluded after its two-year investigation that maintenance of the jackscrew assembly which controls the horizontal stabilizer was a primary cause of the crash as well as the lack of a fail-safe system for the jackscrew.

"This admission of liability means that Boeing did not want the specific problems with the stabilizer of the MD-80 series aircraft be made known to the public," said Kevin P. Durkin, partner at Clifford Law Offices in Chicago and one of the lead counsel serving on the plaintiffs’ Management Committee for the litigation. "It is clear that Boeing and Alaska Airlines are trying to avoid scrutiny of the problems with the MD-80 aircraft series which are still flying in the sky today."

Of the 88 original cases, 16 remain unsettled. Durkin is in San Francisco today where preparations are underway for the first trial set to begin June 17. Several cases have been settled thusfar for confidential amounts. Jurors now are left to decide compensatory damages, which includes lost wages, as well as damages for pre-impact pain and suffering. Punitive damages have been ruled out by the judge in this case

Plaintiffs had asked the court for a trial on the merits, but the court agreed to the uncontested liability stipulation of Boeing’s only on the condition that the court enter an unprecedented judgment of liability against the company.

Since the crash, Boeing has been contending that Alaska Airlines was at fault for failing to properly maintain the aircraft. The two pilots were attempting to make an emergency landing in Los Angeles when the MD-80 crashed en route from Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, to San Francisco and Seattle.