The bolt at top was loose, the one at right was tight & the two with the broken ears were barely snug. Half of the transmission to engine bolts were missing too......
When flex plate is under stress, this is the common place for them to break. These are metal fatigue cracks caused by what you already know- loose bolts. When repairing, don't forget to lube the snout on the torque converter.
Just pulled out my trans and motor. A few years ago, I had given a trans shop four new convertor to flex plate bolts (and some blue loctite) to replace the old ones when they changed the pan gasket. What do I find? Three of the bolts I gave them and one 9.8 metric bolt (shorter than factory bolts), all bolts seemingly over-tightened.
A tip? I installed a mid-plate, 090 thick. I installed the crank spacer. also .090 thick. With the new combined thickness of the spacer and the thick SFI Flexplate the .500 inch Mopar Flexplate bolts were to short. I needed .575 to use all the threads on the crankshaft hub. Solution...Pontiac Flexplate bolts. The heads of the bolts are to tall so you have to reduce the height of the head on the bolt. Use your old "slim head" Mopar bolts as a guide to adjust bolt head thickness. Worked great!