John Barnett had worked for Boeing for 32 years, until his retirement in 2017.
In the days before his death, he had been giving evidence in a whistleblower lawsuit against the company.
Boeing said it was saddened to hear of Mr Barnett’s passing. The Charleston County coroner confirmed his death to the BBC on Monday.
It said the 62-year-old had died from a “self-inflicted” wound on 9 March and police were investigating.
When a person is convicted of certain crimes, the government assumes control over their life in the form of imprisonment. Why shouldn’t the same happen to corporations that commit serious offenses? Any argument against this could be applied tenfold to the incarceration of citizens, but I suspect that defenders of criminal corporations don’t have a consistent view in that regard.
Forget identifying the people responsible, forget pleas that they’ll do better, forget fines-- if you demonstrate that you are willing to use your freedom to abuse society, society gets to tell you what to do. Sometimes for a few years, sometimes forever.