There's more than enough circumstantial evidence to support the allegations of foul play here. When people kill themselves, they usually do it somewhere private and personal to them, like inside their home, or their car. Not in the parking lot outside a courthouse.
Unless its one last troll against boeing on the way out. Why go quietly if you are going to go when you have a shot to majorly embarrass the company one last time?
On the other hand, he might have wanted to go out leaving exactly this sort of mess of optics for boeing PR to deal with. Most people who commit suicide probably aren’t in the national spotlight against the very thing that brought them this point beforehand.
The article above and every other article I've read says, "he was found in his truck". That's a personal vehicle, and assuming it was locked, enough to suggest that it was self-inflicted.
I can close a locked door after shooting someone in the head. I'm not sure how this follows that "it's enough". After years of criticizing Boeing, he kills himself during his deposition? I don't think so.
This is clearly false. "He did it in the parking lot" is nothing like enough evidence to convict anyone. It isn't remotely enough even on the balance of probabilities. I have seen zero evidence for the conspiracy theory, and strong evidence against it, including the fact that his own family think his death was suicide.
Please do not casually spread conspiracy theories. They poison democratic debate, make us all stupider, and distract attention from important, evidenced realities, like the others mentioned in the article.
>>> or their car. Not in the parking lot outside a courthouse.
NO: Barnett's body was found in a vehicle in a Holiday Inn parking lot in Charleston on Saturday, police said.
Or you know this
The family says Barnett's health declined because of the stresses of taking a stand against his longtime employer.
"He was suffering from PTSD and anxiety attacks as a result of being subjected to the hostile work environment at Boeing," they said, "which we believe led to his death."
The man was found dead, with a sucide note (hand written) and his own gun in his hand.
You know what happens when gun owners get the urge to kill themselves. They kill themselves. Guns make suicide less of a cry for help and more or less "effective".
Any article that doesn't mention what his family had to say about the matter is not only creating a narrative, but they are openly disrespecting the family of a dead man to grab attention and headlines.
How about todays interview with his OWN FAMILY:
FROM HIS MOTHER: If this hadn't gone on so long, I'd still have my son, and my sons would have their brother and we wouldn't be sitting here. So in that respect, I do," Vicky Stokes said when asked if she places some of the blame for her son's death on Boeing.
OR THIS: Stokes and her son Rodney Barnett said they do not want to comment on whether they believe he died by suicide until the investigation by the Charleston police department concludes.
It's not like we know or will ever know the details of and the extend of the investigation, the note was actually reported as a "white piece of paper that closely resembled a note,", what was on the note? Were his fingerprints on the note? Was handwriting analysis done? Did the gun belong to him? That wasn't reported either. Was it registered to him/ when/where did he buy it? Was there gunpowder residue on his hand? Does the trajectory and blood splatter analysis all match? Was there surveillance footage of the car? What was his last cellphone usage?
Part of the reason why people jump to conclusions is because of a distinct lack of rationalist reporting by police and media. They don't tell us the empirical evidence because we are supposed to just believe them, and trust in their competent investigation, but that doesn't really work, at least not everyone is going to be satisfied by that demand.
That's not to say it wasn't a suicide, it just means we don't know either way and will likely never know. But it crucially also doesn't mean sufficient evidence couldn't be presented to convince a reasonable observer.
Handwriting analysis and blood spatter is mostly garbage. If he was shot with a gun inside the car from a reasonable angle its not going to be immediately obvious whether he did it or not unless they left bloody fingerprints on the door handle after shooting him twice.
What we do know: this was an AR21 case. It was him suing boeing for forcing him to retire early and not promoting him because he was "whistle blowing". This is a case that had already been dismissed once.
On the matter of that, the FAA already got his reports and agreed with him. The harm to Boeing from his wistle blowing was finished. They were probably paying more for lawyers to fight this than it was going to cost to settle. So this wasnt about Boeing loosing anything other than cash at this point. If we're going to speculate we should be asking if Boeing was fighting this out of spite rather than making a good business decision.
The family themselves have spoken up: that he was troubled, and they firmly blame Boeing for his death. The way they are going about it says "we know he killed himself" ... they just think Boeing drove him to do it. They are coy with the conspiracy theory angle cause it just make boeing look bad...
There is a really interesting narrative here about stress, mental heath, and suicide for gun owners. Topics that the press wants to touch less than the ones your suggesting they ignore....
I care infinitely more about the questions I asked than whatever the family had to say. Because questions about fingerprints and gunpowder residue are concerning the physical evidence that could prove suicide to a reasonable degree.
I don't really care about talking about circumstantial evidence when the physical is right there.
The reason why people aren't convinced by the “this wasn't even about his whistleblowing, he already disclosed everything, so Boeing has no motive“ argument is because it isn't just about stopping whistleblowers, it's about the chilling effect for other potential, current employees.
We can brush it all aside as crazy conspiracy theories, but I think that's actually very harmful to society. Conspiracy thinking is very damaging, our response shouldn't be “shut up and trust authority“ when somebody asks about forensic evidence.
>>> it's about the chilling effect for other potential, current employees.
We agree on this 1000%
"If this hadn't gone on so long, I'd still have my son, and my sons would have their brother and we wouldn't be sitting here. So in that respect, I do," Vicky Stokes said when asked if she places some of the blame for her son's death on Boeing.
Let me restate that: THE MANS OWN MOTHER SAYS BOEING DROVE HIM TO KILL HIMSELF
They didn't need to hold a gun to his head and pull the trigger. The just needed to fuck him over badly enough for long enough for this to be the inevitable outcome.
Blow the whistle all you want kids, Pappa Boeing gonna take your job and fuck you over and there aint nothing you can do about it... Thats the chilling narrative if there ever was one.
