A federal appeals court in San Francisco has upheld a fraud conviction against Elizabeth Holmes. The disgraced founder of the blood-testing startup Theranos is serving an 11-year prison sentence for defrauding investors with false claims of what her company could achieve.

Summary

Elizabeth Holmes lost her appeal to overturn her fraud conviction, with a federal court ruling there were no legal missteps in her trial.

The court also upheld the conviction of her former partner, Sunny Balwani, and ordered both to pay $452 million in restitution.

Holmes, serving an 11-year sentence, falsely claimed her startup Theranos had revolutionary blood-testing technology.

The fraud, exposed in 2015, became one of Silicon Valley’s biggest scandals, leading to Theranos’ collapse and widespread media coverage, including books, documentaries, and a TV series.

    • @assembly
      60•19 hours ago

      The problem is that she screwed rich people over. If she stuck with just screwing over everyone else she would have been fine.

      • ZerlynaEnglish
        8•19 hours ago

        I remember reading about Theranos starting up, watched the documentary and podcast. The false positives (or negatives) was appalling.

    • Snot FlickermanEnglish
      28•20 hours ago

      Hey now, let’s not ignore how deeply misogynistic the Trump administration is. That definitely plays a role.

    • Boomer Humor DoomergodEnglish
      24•20 hours ago

      She’s a blonde woman so he probably had some… special quid pro quo