Theranos trial: Prosecutor rests case against Elizabeth Holmes | Criminal news
After 10 weeks, prosecutors have rested their case against Theranos’ founder in a high-profile lawsuit in Silicon Valley in the United States.
By Bloomberg
Published on November 19, 2021
Prosecutors on Friday closed their case against Theranos Inc. founder Elizabeth Holmes in her high-profile Silicon Valley lawsuit.
Jurors in the federal court in San Jose, California, have seen the government present evidence over 10 weeks through witnesses, documents, emails, video clips and audio recordings of the entrepreneur who dropped out of Stanford University to launch the start of blood tests and earn as its CEO.
Holmes, 37, is battling allegations that she went to great lengths to deceive patients and investors while building Theranos into a $ 9 billion company before it collapsed in 2018. She and Theranos president Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani became accused of conspiracy and fraud. year. They each risk up to 20 years in prison if convicted; Balwani will be prosecuted separately next year and has pleaded not guilty.
The government has claimed that Holmes dazzled partners and investors with the expectation that they would take part in – and reap the benefits of – a revolution in healthcare, even though she knew her blood test was a failed technology.
As Holmes begins to present his defense, a big question remains unanswered: Will she testify? It seems unlikely that jurors will hear from her until next week at the earliest.
U.S. District Judge Edward Davila told jurors Friday that the trial is unlikely to end before Dec. 6, as originally planned. The judge addressed the lawyers on both sides while the jury was out of the courtroom.
“I do not think any of you, I hope none of you, are strategic in terms of timing,” he said. “None of you want the jury to hear the case in the third week of December.”
Holmes’ lawyers have told the court that their first witness will be an employee of the defense team’s law firm, Williams & Connolly.
Lawyers for Holmes also indicated that they intended to call as a witness former Amgen Inc. Vice President Fabrizio Bonanni, who joined the board of directors of Theranos in 2016 after being besieged by regulatory control. Amy Saharia, a lawyer for Holmes, told the court that Bonanni would testify to the former Theranos CEO’s state of mind about her analysts that she “believed in the technology to the last.”
(Updates with highlights from the trial period)
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