Elizabeth Holmes Found Guilty of Four Charges of Fraud

[PJMcK]

Source: NY Times

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of the failed blood testing start-up Theranos, was found guilty of four charges of fraud on Monday, in a case that came to symbolize the pitfalls of Silicon Valley’s culture of hustle, hype and greed.

Ms. Holmes was the most prominent tech executive to field fraud accusations in a generation of high-flying, money-losing start-ups. A jury of eight men and four women took 50 hours to reach a verdict, convicting her of three counts of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. She was found not guilty on four other counts.

Each count carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison, terms that are likely to be served concurrently. Ms. Holmes is expected to appeal.

The verdict stands out for its rarity. Few technology executives are charged with fraud and even fewer are convicted. If sentenced to prison, Ms. Holmes would be the most notable female executive to serve time since Martha Stewart did in 2004 after lying to investigators about a stock sale. And Theranos, which dissolved in 2018, is likely to stand as a warning to other Silicon Valley start-ups that stretch the truth to score funding and business deals.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/01/03/technology/elizabeth-holmes-trial-verdict

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She’ll probably get less than five years. Criminal.

[Sancho]

1. She may be guilty, and deserve prison...but how does her crime stack up against the orange idiot!

...he's done much worse for much longer.

[PJMcK]

2. True but...

… we still have to go after other bad actors, too.

Holmes bilked investors out of a lot of money. She lied and scammed people. Doesn’t she deserve to be punished?

The walls are slowly closing in on Trump.

[YP_Yooper]

3. For perspective

This poor guy faced 7 years in prison for $0.43.
We all need to put these high rolling frauds to prison for life.

A man was arrested in Pennsylvania and is facing felony charges after allegedly paying just 43 cents less than the cost of a soda at a convenience store. Joseph Sobolewski grabbed a 20-ounce bottle of Mountain Dew at a store in Perry County, Pennsylvania last month. The store was charging $3 for two bottles of the beverage, PennLive first reported. Sobolewski put $2 on the counter and left the store.

But a single bottle of the beverage cost $2.29, not $1.50. So, the man was allegedly underpaying by 43 cents, including tax. Sobolewski has two previous theft charges, including driving away from a gas station without paying for a tank of gasoline and stealing a pair of shoes.

[stopdiggin]

4. that is of course egregious

but these results are kind of inevitable with legislative bodies insisting on 'three strike' laws (and other punitive apparatus).

In fairness - a lot of lawmakers, and jurisdictions, are waking up to 'unintended consequences' - but it takes a fairly long time to correct a judicial system that has been lurching in one direction for the last 50 years. (and a whole boatload of voters out there that are still not on board with anything less than 'tough on crime.' .)

[ShazzieB]

5. ☝ This x 1000! ☝

[ShazzieB]

6. Good verdict.

What a scamster. So glad she didn't get away with it.

For anyone not familiar with the case, I recommend reading Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup by John Carreyrou. It's a great read and lays out all the details. I could hardly put it down.

[oioioi]

7. ..."is likely to stand as a warning to other Silicon Valley start-ups that stretch the truth"...

Tesla privately admits Elon Musk has been exaggerating about ‘full self-driving’

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has been overstating the capabilities of the company’s advanced driver assist system, the company’s director of Autopilot software told the California Department of Motor Vehicles. The comments came from a memo released by legal transparency group PlainSite, which obtained the documents from a public records request.

It was the latest revelation about the widening gap between what Musk says publicly about Autopilot and what Autopilot can actually do. And it coincides with Tesla coming under increased scrutiny after a Tesla vehicle without anyone in the driver’s seat crashed in Texas, killing two men.

https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/7/22424592/tesla-elon-musk-autopilot-dmv-fsd-exaggeration

[mpcamb]

8. ..."is likely to stand as a warning" Does that mean"no need to chase other perps?"

Last edited Tue Jan 4, 2022, 10:27 AM - Edit history (3)

Long complicated cases, headline grabbing, but hard to prosecute ones.
Is this code for "we'll let you others
1) off with a warning"
2) settle out of court"
3) act chastised"
4) go unpunished"

Or all of the above?

[obamanut2012]

9. Experts say she will get 8-12 years

Probably eight to ten, and that's Federal time, so she'll serve almost the entire thing.

[jmowreader]

10. I have a small issue with this verdict

Don’t get me wrong: Ms. Holmes needs to be folding sheets in a prison laundry for a really long time, and she’s certain to get her chance.

The issue is the crime she committed, swindling the rich, seems to be the only economic crime they ever want to prosecute. If you set up a megachurch and swindle your parishioners, an MLM and screw your “distributors” out of every cent they have, or a fake university you’re seen as a great person. My beautician has a whole room full of Mary Kay she can barely give away because no one wants to pay department store prices for drugstore-quality makeup. There are thousands of men whose garages are full of overpriced Amsoil - it’s no better than Mobil 1 but it’s six dollars a quart more expensive. And we won’t even mention Amway, where you get in trouble for trying to sell the shit.

True story: one of my classmates in spy school was an Amway distributor before he enlisted. The reason he got into Amway was he found out just how good their whole house water filtration system is - this is no shit, their water filter is better than anything else on the market. So, instead of doing the whole “down line” thing Amway wants you to do, he set up a business selling, installing and servicing that water filter. Got a plumbing license and everything, and was making enough to support his family. Amway found out what he was doing and cut off his supply of water filters.

Elizabeth Holmes is going where she needs to. The DeVos family and Joel Osteen are still walking the streets. What is wrong with this picture?

[AdamGG]

11. Swindling Betsy DeVos was one of the 4 charges Holmes was convicted on

I'm glad that the jury found Elizabeth Holmes guilty on some of the charges (4/11), but she's clearly very guilty of all of them and I still view her as an example of white/white collar privilege. She will likely now spend years free, living her lavish lifestyle, while her lawyers mount multiple appeals.

If someone with desperate life circumstances robs $1,000 from a liquor store with a gun, they're going directly to prison to serve hard time. Massive corporate criminals, like the executives at Enron, if their appeals are exhausted, serve a fraction of the time in a much cushier facility.

The years of blatant, orchestrated deceit that Holmes coordinated, which put many patients' health in jeopardy, is a more impactful crime than robbing a liquor store. She should be behind bars today. Her defense tried to sway the jury with claims that she was in an abusive relationship, which has nothing to do with spending years orchestrating an elaborate con. And, no one would care if an inner city criminal behind a hold up had a less than ideal home life.

I hope the prosecution retries Holmes on the 3 counts that the jury was deadlocked on, but from the reporting I've seen, that's supposedly unlikely. Someone with her privilege and upbringing (she had close family connections with George Schultz) definitely knew what she was doing was wrong and had plenty of other opportunities where she didn't have to take this path.

She deserves to spend decades in prison, but I suspect that in the end, it will amount to, at most, a few years. Then, she'll probably write a book, or have some kind of post sentence career, like G. Gordon Liddy.