Boeing whistleblower attorney Brian Knowles, along with co-counsel Rob Turkewitz, represented both of the men who spoke out about manufacturing practices they witnessed, then died under tragic circumstances in the past two months. John Barnett, a quality manager at the Boeing 787 plant in North Charleston, SC, died of what appears to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound in his Dodge Ram truck, and Joshua Dean, an inspector at Boeing fuselage supplier Spirit AeroSystems, perished after being stricken days earlier by the sudden onset of MRSA that caused a fatal staph infection.
In an exclusive interview, Knowles tells Fortune that a flock of new whistleblowers whom he and Turkewitz represent will soon step forward. “You’ll see more whistleblowers coming out soon,” he says. “More than ten whistleblowers who are our clients from Boeing, Spirit and another supplier besides Spirit will speak up in the near future.” According to Knowles, the shocking deaths of Barnett and Dean have only encouraged these clients to speak up. “They consider those two figures who put so much on the line to speak out as heroes,” he adds. “These whistleblowers are already putting a great deal at risk in terms of stress and potential damage to their careers, and will soon be getting their messages out publicly, just as Barnett and Dean did.”
One of the whistleblowers in the wings represented by Knowles and Turkewitz just stepped forward. On May 8, Santiago Paredes, who served as a quality inspector as Spirit from 2010 to 2022, told the BBC and CBS news that Spirit regularly shipped Boeing fuselages with 50 to 200 defective parts. Spirit says that it “strongly disagrees” with Paredes’ assertions.
The new group of whistleblowers are a mix of current and former employees, says Knowles. When the workers found what they deemed breaches in Boeing’s or Spirit’s processes and procedures that caused manufacturing defects, they initially alerted their managers, he asserts. But when the higher-ups failed to take the measures that in the workers’ view, were needed to correct the work, the whistleblowers filed complaints with federal regulators, including the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
One of the clients still on the job faced retaliation from Boeing management, says Knowles. “The only remedy for retaliatory conduct is to file what’s called an Air21 complaint with OSHA that seeks compensation for encountering a hostile work environment,” Knowles says. He and Turkewitz lodged an AIR21 claim on behalf of Barnett, the precursor to the Labor Department lawsuit versus Boeing for which he testified in the two days before his death. “But even if workers can’t file an Air21, they can still come forward. And that’s going to happen,” says Knowles.
Knowles notes that Air21 actions must be filed within 90 days of when the alleged retaliatory behavior occurred. If the reports from the whistleblowers result in fines against Boeing or its suppliers levied by regulators the whistleblowers may be entitled to rewards. “If the government wants people to become whistleblowers, regulators need to provide some incentive to come forward,” Knowles observes.
Knowles insists that it’s precisely the bravery of folks such as Barnett and Dean that’s needed to restore top levels of safety and quality to the legendary manufacturing machine at Boeing. And, he says, a new group of whistleblowers will soon perpetuate their tradition on a mission he describes as “all part of an effort to help put Boeing and Spirit back on the right track, and protect the flying public.”