A federal court rejected Elizabeth Holmes’ last-ditch appeal Monday as the disgraced Theranos founder attempted to overturn her fraud conviction.
Another appeal from Holmes’ former business partner and lover, Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani, was similarly rejected by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.
Holmes and Balwani argued there were several errors in their initial fraud trials, but a three-judge panel on the 9th Circuit was unmoved and rejected all arguments in a 54-page ruling.
“The grandiose achievements touted by Holmes and Balwani were half-truths and outright lies,” Judge Jacqueline H. Nguyen wrote in the court opinion.
Holmes, 41, began serving her 11-year prison sentence on May 30, 2023. The federal Bureau of Prisons lists her current scheduled release date as March 19, 2032; her sentence was reduced by two years for good behavior.
Following her conviction in January 2022 on four counts of fraud, Holmes made numerous attempts to stay out of prison. However, she was forced to report to a minimum-security lockup in Texas nearly 17 months later, even while her appeal was heard.
Balwani, 59, was sentenced to 13 years in prison for his own fraud conviction. He’s scheduled for release in 2033.
In the early 2010s, Holmes became one of the biggest stars in Silicon Valley after founding Theranos and claiming to develop a world-changing blood testing device that could run diagnostics with a single drop of blood.
However, the signature device did not work, and Holmes greatly exaggerated the company’s partnerships and achievements. The fraud was initially exposed in a series of Wall Street Journal articles beginning in 2015, and the company’s investors lost millions of dollars.
With News Wire Services
