The U.S. Justice Department expects to have a decision by the end of this month on whether it will pursue criminal claims against Boeing following two fatal 737 Max crashes.

Federal prosecutors are set to meet on May 31 with the families who lost loved ones in those crashes more than five years ago to share their decision, according to a letter sent Tuesday to those victims’ families and shared with The Seattle Times.

At the daylong meeting, federal prosecutors and the victims’ families will discuss a deferred prosecution agreement Boeing entered into in 2021 that allowed the company to avoid criminal charges if it met certain conditions for the next three years. Boeing faced a single fraud charge after failing to disclose information about a new software system that was largely to blame for the two crashes, killing 346 people in 2018 and 2019.

That agreement expired in January — days after a panel blew off a Boeing 737 Max 9 plane, reigniting scrutiny of the airplane manufacturer and casting doubt on whether the company had followed through on its promises made following the fatal Max crashes.

The panel blowout didn’t spark the Justice Department’s meeting with victims’ families, nor did recent congressional hearings, whistleblower testimony or investigations from the Federal Aviation Administration. The timeline was set back in 2021 as part of the deferred prosecution agreement.

But recent events could factor into federal prosecutors’ decision about what comes next.

This week, another FAA probe may have reopened the question of Boeing’s compliance with the agreement. On Monday, the FAA said it was investigating Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner after the company disclosed employees had falsified inspection records.

It’s not clear when that occurred — or if it fell in the three-year window of the deferred prosecution agreement — but the new investigation could draw attention to one prong of the agreement: Boeing agreed it would not deliberately provide to regulators any “false, incomplete or misleading information.”

The Justice Department has until July, six months after the agreement expired, to determine if Boeing has breached the agreement, or to ask for more time to make that determination. If it finds the company did not comply, it could ask a judge to reopen the criminal case that had been on hold.

As part of the 2021 agreement, Boeing and the victims’ families have 30 days to respond to the Justice Department’s decision before the parties head to court in Texas, where the deferred prosecution agreement was signed.

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