Holmes, CEO Of Theranos, Faces A 15-Year Sentence From Prosecutors

Elizabeth Holmes, the disgraced former chief executive officer of Theranos, has been asked by federal prosecutors to be sentenced to 15 years in prison. The prosecutors argue that she deserves a lengthy prison term because her massive scheme defrauded investors out of hundreds of millions of dollars by falsely convincing them that her company had developed a revolutionary blood testing device.

Prosecutors fiercely rejected the defense attorneys’ assessment of the case as one in which Holmes had been unfairly persecuted, in part because of media publicity. They referred to the case as “one of the most severe white collar felonies Silicon Valley or any other District has seen.”

Nearly a year after she was convicted of three felony charges of wire fraud and one felony count of conspiracy to commit fraud, Holmes is scheduled to appear for sentencing on November 18 in federal court in San Jose, California. The court is located in the state of California. She faces a possible maximum sentence of twenty years in jail for each offense.

In a brief that was filed on Friday and was 46 pages long, Assistant United States Attorney Robert S. Leach said, “She routinely chose lies, hype, and the potential of billions of dollars over patient safety and fair dealing with investors.” “Elizabeth Holmes’ sins did not consist of failing to perform her duties; rather, they consisted of lying — lying in the most serious situation, where everyone expected her to speak the truth.”
The legal team for Holmes turned in an 82-page paper late on Thursday night, asking for a sentence of no more than 18 months in prison. They claimed that their client’s reputation had been irreparably damaged, turning her into a “caricature to be laughed and hated.”

In addition to requesting that Holmes receive a lengthy prison sentence, prosecutors have demanded that the 38-year-old pay a total of $803,840,309 in restitution for her role in the multi-year scheme that helped her become one of the most well-known and extremely wealthy businesswomen in Silicon Valley and the United States.

She played on the investors’ expectations that a youthful and innovative entrepreneur had revolutionized the healthcare industry. She did this by capitalizing on the credibility of her distinguished board,” Leach wrote. “And as a result of her dishonesty, she was able to amass a fortune of billions of dollars in addition to her extraordinary popularity.”

Leach also brought up the fact that after the scam was discovered by a reporter for the Wall Street Journal named John Carreyrou, Holmes “attacked him, along with his sources” and desperately tried to place responsibility on other people.
In July, during a separate trial, the 57-year-old former chief operating officer of the company, Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani, was found guilty on 12 felony counts of fraud committed against investors and patients. On December 7th, he is set to get his sentence.

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Leach further stated that the actions that Holmes had taken were hazardous to the patients’ health, putting their lives in peril.

According to what he wrote, “when money began to run out, she went to market with an unproven and unreliable medical equipment.” “When her primary assay developer resigned as Theranos was launching, she said in a terrifying manner to the scientist,’she has a promise to fulfill to the client, she doesn’t have much of an option except to go forward with the launch.’”

The counsel for Holmes have claimed that if the United States District Judge Edward Davila decides to send her to jail, she should be given a moderate sentence because she does not present a threat to the general public and she does not have a history of committing any crimes in the past.

“At trial, she blamed everyone but herself, including her COO (who also happened to be her longterm lover), her board, her scientists, her business partners, her investors, her marketing agency, her attorneys, and the media,” Leach wrote. “Everyone, that is, except herself.”