John Barnett, 62, worked for Boeing for over half his life. Prior to his retirement in 2017, he worked on the 787 Dreamliner as a quality manager at the Boeing factory in North Charleston, South Carolina. In recent years, Barnett adopted a new role as whistleblower against the aerospace and defense corporation. According to Barnett's lawsuit against Boeing, workers were using "sub-standard" parts on the Boeing 787 aircraft, and leadership was ignoring malfunctions to save money. The whistleblower also claimed the company illegally retaliated against him for raising a stink about possible safety issues. When Barnett failed to show up to complete his pretrial deposition, police executed a welfare check, ultimately finding him on May 9, dead in his locked Dodge Ram truck outside the Holiday Inn where he was staying with a gunshot wound to the head. After months of wild speculation and innuendos, the Charleston Police Department revealed on May 17 that it had concluded its investigation into Barnett's death, reported the Post and Courier. The CPD statement referenced Charleston County Coroner Bobbi Jo O'Neal's final autopsy report, which indicated that all findings were consistent with a self-inflicted gunshot wound. 'Bury me face down so Boeing and their lying-ass leaders can kiss my ass.' WCBD-TV indicated there were multiple factors that prompted authorities to conclude Barnett took his own life: Barnett was found locked inside his car with the key fob in his pants pocket. There were no signs of forced entry or defensive injuries. Barnett previously struggled with mental health issues. The gun found in Barnett's hand was registered under his name and purchased in 2000. The trajectory of the bullet aligned with the gunshot wound observed and was fired by the decedent's gun. Barnett's phone records and hotel key use showed no signs of unusual activity. Security footage showed Barnett leaving the Holiday Inn on Savannah Highway by himself at 8:37 p.m. the night before his body was found. Footage also shows Barnett's truck backing into a parking spot minutes later — a spot where it remained until the next day. Security footage showed no evidence of anybody besides Barnett interacting with his truck. Investigators also found what appears to have been a suicide note on the passenger seat of his truck impressed only with Barnett's fingerprints. A copy of the note obtained by the New York Post reads, "America, come together or die!! I pray the motherf***ers that destroyed my life pay!!! I pray Boeing pays!!! Bury me face down so Boeing and their lying-ass leaders can kiss my ass." "Whistleblowers protection is f***ed up too!!" Barnett noted. "I can't do this any longer!!! Enough!!" Extra to writing "TRUMP 2024" and "I wasn't stoned when I wrote this ... really," Barnett apparently wrote, "To my family and friends, I found my purpose." Authorities claim to have authenticated the handwriting as belonging to Barnett, reported the Post. "We remain acutely aware of the sensitivity and public interest surrounding this case," a CPD spokesman said in a statement obtained by WCBD. "It is important to emphasize that our investigation was guided strictly by facts and evidence while remaining undisturbed by conjecture and external pressures." Blaze News previously reported that Barnett sounded the alarm in 2019 that up to 25% of oxygen systems on the 787 Dreamliner could be faulty and fail to work when needed. He also alleged that faulty parts were intentionally installed on aircraft at a Boeing factory and suggested that in at least one instance plane parts were sourced from scrap bins. Barnett told the New York Times in 2019, "I haven't seen a plane out of Charleston yet that I'd put my name on saying it's safe and airworthy." Boeing has long denied the allegations even though some of Barnett's concerns were reportedly substantiated by a 2017 Federal Aviation Administration review. Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

It might look like a toy spaceship from the 1980s, but this retro-styled box could convert your laptop into a serious gaming rig. The new Ayaneo AG01 Graphics Starship not only has a charming design that would be at home in a toybox with E.T. and He-Man, but this external GPU dock contains an AMD Radeon RX 7600M XT GPU, and can even expand your laptop’s SSD storage. Continue reading Ayaneo’s new retro spaceship toy upgrades your laptop to an AMD GPU MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Ryzen 7 7800X3D review, Best gaming CPU, Radeon RX 7800 XT review

My hopes for Grand Theft Auto 6, I worry, are quite different from Rockstar’s own ambitions. I don’t like Grand Theft Auto San Andreas. I think it’s directionless, too open, and too silly. Similarly, I don’t enjoy anything about (the single-player) of Grand Theft Auto 5. GTA 3, Vice City, and more broadly Red Dead Redemption 2 are more my preference. I prefer when Rockstar is contained and somber, and willing to sacrifice player freedom in exchange for a more coherent plot. Perhaps it was before its time. Perhaps it was too different. Nevertheless, the best GTA game is now just $6. Continue reading The best Grand Theft Auto game is less than $6 MORE FROM PCGAMESN: GTA 6 release date, Best GTA 5 mods, Best GTA RP servers

You might think that a Baldur's Gate 3 and Stardew Valley crossover wouldn't work. You'd be wrong. Gale, Astarion, Shadowheart, and the gang look like they'd fit right in - and this team of mods agree. With multiple romanceable NPCs and a whole new part of Pelican Town called Baldur's Village, this ambitious mod is looking better than ever, and it's not even out yet. Continue reading Big Baldur’s Gate 3 Stardew Valley mod gets another romanceable NPC MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Stardew Valley multiplayer, Stardew Valley realism, The best Stardew Valley mods

As we step into the third week of Season 59 in Clash Royale, the weekly event drifts away from the new Void card and Wizard Evolution, instead bringing back an old event in a new form. The Spell Cauldron event is a new variant of Capture the Sparky, but this time you will fight over capturing a random buff!

Xboxs Game Pass service will be altered following the release of this years unannounced Call of Duty, its claimed by an insider.

That Time I Sent a Message in a Bottle Across the Ocean...and Got a Reply!

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge One of Microsoft’s most consequential hardware events in years is about to take place. It’s not Microsoft Build — the company’s developer conference — which kicks off on Tuesday. Instead, Microsoft is holding a small event today, May 20th, to talk about its next Surface devices. At the event, we’re expecting Microsoft to announce new versions of the Surface Pro 10 and the Surface Laptop 6, both running on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X Elite processors. It’s Microsoft’s latest attempt to switch to Arm — and one that the company believes is finally going to stick. The change should deliver far better battery life; and if early rumors are true, Qualcomm’s chip should be powerful enough to keep up with the Intel processors it’s replacing. ... Continue reading…

OpenAI says “AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity’s distinctive voice.” | Photo: Warner Bros. OpenAI is pulling the ChatGPT voice that sounds remarkably similar to Scarlett Johansson after numerous headlines (and even Saturday Night Live) noted the similarity. The voice, known as Sky, is now being put on “pause,” the company says. “We believe that AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity’s distinctive voice— Sky’s voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using her own natural speaking voice,” OpenAI wrote this morning. OpenAI CTO Mira Murati denied that the imitation of Johansson was intentional in an interview with The Verge last week. Even if Johansson’s voice wasn’t directly referenced, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was seemingly already aware of the similarities,... Continue reading…

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge You may not have even thought about replacing your AirTag yet, but Bloomberg reports that Apple is working on a new one that could arrive in mid-2025. The new AirTag will reportedly feature an updated chip with better location tracking — an improvement it might need as competition among tracking devices ramps up. By the time Apple rolls out its refreshed AirTag, the Bluetooth tracking landscape will look a lot different on both Android and iOS. Last month, Google revealed its new Find My Device network, which lets users locate their phones using signals from nearby Android devices. Even Life360, the safety service company that owns Tile, is creating its own location-tracking network that uses satellites to locate its Bluetooth tags. In... Continue reading…