Boeing whistleblower John Barnett’s eerie warning before he was found shot dead in his truck outside a motel amid lawsuit against the aviation giant: ‘If anything happens to me, it’s not suicide’
A close friend of Boeing whistleblower John Barnett said he predicted he could end up dead before he was shot last week.
The 62-year-old was found in his truck in the parking lot of a hotel in South Carolina, seven years after he retired from a 32-year career at Boeing.
Barnett’s death came during a whistleblower lawsuit alleging that workers under pressure deliberately fitted substandard parts to aircraft on the assembly line.
Good family friend Jennifer has now told the story WPDE that Barnett had warned her that something like this would happen to him.
She told the outlet, “I said, ‘Aren’t you scared?’ And he said, ‘No, I’m not afraid, but if something happens to me, it won’t be suicide.’
The 62-year-old was found in his truck in a hotel parking lot in South Carolina, seven years after he retired from a 32-year career at Boeing
Close family friend Jennifer, seen here, has now told WPDE that Barnett warned her something like this would happen to him
Jennifer continued, “I know he didn’t commit suicide. There is no way. He loved life too much.
‘He loved his family too much. He loved his brothers too much to let them go through what they are going through now.”
Jennifer believes someone “didn’t like what he had to say” and wanted to “shut him up.”
She added: “That’s why they made it look like suicide. I don’t care what they say, I know Mitch didn’t do that.’
Barnett had claimed that second-rate parts were literally pulled from scrap bins before being fitted to aircraft under construction to avoid delays.
A 2017 review by the FAA confirmed some of its concerns, prompting Boeing to take action.
He had just given a statement to Boeing’s lawyers for the case last week, his attorney Brian Knowles said.
The Charleston County coroner, meanwhile, confirmed Monday that the longtime Boeing executive died Friday while in town for interviews related to the case.
Barnett had claimed that second-rate parts were literally pulled from scrap bins before being fitted to aircraft under construction to avoid delays
Shown here is Boeing’s assembly plant in North Charleston – where the deceased worked for decades
Boeing also responded to the former employee’s death in their own statement as news spread, saying it was “saddened by the passing of Mr. Barnett.”
The statement did not elaborate on any aspect of the case, but ultimately added: “Our thoughts are with his family and friends.”
Staff at the Holiday Inn, where Barnett was found dead, said he was doing well the night before his “suicide.”
Barnett ate a quesadilla, drank a Coke, scrolled on his phone and seemed fine on the evening of March 8, the unnamed hotel employee told the New York Post.
His attorney previously questioned the coroner’s findings that the gunshot wound was “self-inflicted,” saying Barnett was in good spirits between statements.
A police report obtained by DailyMail.com shows that Barnett extended his stay at the Holiday Inn two days before his suspected suicide and was due to check out the day before the alarm was raised.
The report states that a friend of Barnett contacted the hotel at 10 a.m. on March 9 requesting a welfare check, during which employees knocked on his hotel room door with no response.
An employee then searched the hotel parking lot for his orange Dodge Ram and discovered Barnett deceased in the driver’s seat with a “silver pistol” in his right hand.
Barnett had his “right index finger still on the trigger” and suffered a “gunshot wound near his right temple,” according to Charleston police.
The report added that a “white piece of paper that closely resembled a note” was clearly visible on the passenger seat. The contents of the note have not yet been released.
The factory where Barnett worked for decades is where Boeing builds the 787 Dreamliner, one of several aircraft crafts that have been making headlines lately.
About 50 people were treated by first responders on Monday after a Boeing 787 Dreamliner flying from Australia to New Zealand experienced a “technical event” that caused a “strong motion” that shook passengers in their seats.
The company told airlines on Friday to start inspecting switches on pilot seats after a report found that an accidental movement of the cockpit seat caused the dive.
In a separate incident in early January, an unused emergency exit door blew off a brand new Boeing 737 Max shortly after takeoff from Portland International, sparking an ongoing DOJ investigation.
On Friday, shortly before the incident over the Indian Ocean, Boeing said it believed the technical fault involving the door stemmed from something that occurred during production, where the required documentation never allowed for the removal of a key part that failed .
About 50 people were treated by first responders on Monday after a Boeing 787 Dreamliner flying from Australia to New Zealand experienced a “technical event” that caused a “strong motion” that jolted passengers in their seats
Meanwhile, in a separate incident in early January, an unused emergency exit door blew off a brand new Boeing 737 Max shortly after takeoff from Portland International, sparking an ongoing DOJ investigation.
Also on Friday, the company said it is “committed to continuing to cooperate fully and transparently with the National Transportation Safety Board’s investigation,” which remains ongoing more than three months later.
Barnett’s job for 32 years was to oversee production standards for the company’s aircraft – standards he said were not met during his four years at the then-new Charleston plant from 2010 to 2014.
“The new leadership didn’t understand the processes,” Barnett told Corporate Crime Reporter in a 2019 interview about how buyers reportedly cut corners to get their then-state-of-the-art 7878s ready on time.
“They brought them from other parts of the company,” he continued, two years after his retirement in 20017.
“The new leadership team – from my principal to now – were all from St. Louis, Missouri. They said they were all friends there.”
“That whole team crashed,” he continued. “They were from the military side. My impression was that their mentality was: we’re going to do it the way we want to do it. Their motto at the time was: We’re in Charleston and we can do anything we want.”
Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun speaks to reports at the Capitol in January after MAX 9 planes were grounded following the door incident. The company is now under criminal investigation
“They started pressuring us not to document defects, to work outside procedures, to allow defective material to be installed without being corrected.
“They started bypassing procedures and losing control over aircraft configuration and losing control over non-compliant parts. They just wanted the planes to be pushed out the door and the cash register to ring.
Barnett claimed he informed the factory’s superiors of his doubts, but no action was ever taken. Boeing denied this, as well as his claims.
A 2017 investigation by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) refuted some of Barnett’s concerns, including concluding that at least 53 “non-compliant” parts — as they put it — were misplaced and considered lost.
The company is now under criminal investigation over the door incident on board the Max plane last January