What billions of dollars.

The man had already been on film. He already has written statements everywhere. The FAA already agreed that what he said had happened.

He was in court for AIR21 case... to get money out of boeing for himself, for 10 years of early retirement. Candidly Boeing was probably paying more for the lawyers they were using to fight him than they would have paid just settling.

There weren't billons on the line with this.

The reason you don’t settle is to discourage others from doing the same thing. It would also be the reason to ‘suicide’ someone even if they were not costing you much money.

Exactly, they weren't stopping him, they were stopping every other future whistleblower. Imagine if even 3 more people stepped forward.