Day in Court
Federal District Court Judge in Texas, in the criminal case against the company, has ruled that the families of the crash victims will be allowed to present their views on the settlement agreement previously reached between the Department of Justice and the company. This follows a ruling some months ago in which the court stated that the families met the legal (statutory) definition of crime victims, and thus should have had opportunities to present their views on the settlement agreement of the criminal charges prior to its conclusion.
So, the company now will have to be arraigned on the charges and, presumably, enter a plea, insofar as the arraignment phase of the proceeding is when crime victims or their representatives (here, the families) present their views.
According to the WSJ news article, the DOJ had some discussions with the families as recently as November, inasmuch as the settlement was a product of the Department under the prior presidential administration's direction.
The court did not rule on aspects of the families' motion seeking to change certain terms of the settlement (technically, iirc, a Deferred Prosecution Agreement).
SLF/attorney guest on this forum will read court's order and see if anything further seems reasonably possibly interesting to the aviators and other real people. Things could get interesting: next court date, January 26.
(I was perhaps outspoken on this forum in decrying the prosecution of Forkner; there's some saying about what payback is, and maybe this is yet to be visited upon the Defendant in this matter.)