Ex-Boeing pilot found not guilty in 737 MAX criminal case (NYSE:BA)

Boeing’s (NYSE:BA) former chief technical pilot for 737 MAX has been acquitted by a federal jury in Texas of charges that he tried to deceived the Federal Aviation Administration about the plane’s MCAS flight control system later blamed for two fatal crashes.

The jury found Mark Forkner – the company’s chief technical pilot for the 737 MAX during the plane’s development – not guilty on all four counts of wire fraud.

Federal prosecutors accused Forkner of tricking Stacey Klein, his FAA counterpart, into approving lighter training requirements to avoid costing Boeing tens of millions of dollars.

Defense attorneys argued Forkner was not an engineer and that many others were involved in the flight control system’s design and certification.

In a sign the model is closer to returning to commercial flights in China after a three-year grounding, a 737 MAX jet recently completed a test flight from Seattle to Boeing’s delivery center in Zhoushan.