Government Contracting
In 1989 Boeing pleaded guilty and paid a penalty of more than $5 million in connection with charges that it illegally obtained classified Pentagon planning documents.
In April 1994 Boeing paid $75 million to settle charges that it systematically overcharged and mischarged the federal government on military contracts over the course of more than a decade.
In November 1997 Boeing subsidiary McDonnell Douglas agreed to pay $2 million to settle allegations that it overcharged the Pentagon in a contract to repair aircraft manufacturing equipment.
In August 2000 Boeing agreed to pay up to $54 million to resolve two whistleblower lawsuits charging that the company placed defective gears in CH-47D Chinook helicopters and then sold the aircraft to the U.S. Army.
In November 2000 Boeing and United Space Alliance agreed to pay a total of $825,000 and give up their rights to $1.2 million in unpaid invoices to settle allegations of overbilling NASA for work overseen between 1986 and 1992 by Rockwell Space Operations (later purchased by Boeing).
In July 2003 the U.S. Air Force stripped Boeing of $1 billion in potential revenue as a penalty for obtained documents stolen from its rival Lockheed Martin during a contract competition for military satellites.
In November 2003 Boeing dismissed its chief financial officer when it came to light that he had offered a job to an Air Force procurement official while she was in negotiations with the company on a $20 billion contract to supply aerial refueling tankers.
Also fired was the former procurement official, Darleen Druyun, who had accepted the job offer. The scandal also led to the resignation of Boeing’s chief executive. In 2004 Druyun was sentenced to nine months in federal prison after admitting that she had lied to prosecutors about approving inflated prices on contracts awarded to Boeing to enhance her job prospects with the company. Boeing’s former chief financial officer also pleaded guilty to a conflict-of-interest charge.
In the wake of the Druyun scandal, Congress barred the Pentagon from pursuing the aerial tanker deal with Boeing, and in March 2008 it was awarded to a partnership of Northrop Grumman and Airbus parent EADS. Three months later, however, the competition was reopened and ended up back with Boeing.
In June 2006 Boeing agreed to pay a record $615 million to settle federal civil and criminal charges that it improperly used competitors’ information to procure contracts for launch services worth billions of dollars from the U.S. Air Force and NASA.
In August 2009 Boeing agreed to pay $25 million to settle allegations that it performed defective work on the entire KC-10 Extender fleet, a mainstay of the Air Force’s aerial refueling fleet used in Iraq and Afghanistan.
In October 2010 Boeing agreed to pay $4 million to settle a civil lawsuit alleging that it unlawfully inflated the price it charged the Air Force to produce the Towed Decoy System for the B-1 bomber.
In January 2012 Boeing agreed to pay more than $4.3 million to resolve charges that it improperly billed the Pentagon for the remanufacture of Chinook helicopters at its plant in Ridley Park, Pennsylvania.