From the start, Elizabeth Holmes knew learn how to inform a very good story. She launched her blood testing firm, Theranos, with a story of a strong imaginative and prescient to revolutionize well being care and alter an previous, outdated business. She offered herself as Steve Jobs, half two. She sketched out an image of somebody in management.
That Holmes, and that story, is what prosecutor John Bostic labored to reset again to throughout his rebuttal argument, the final phrase earlier than the case went to the jury on Friday afternoon. It wasn’t cheap to suppose the CEO of an organization didn’t know precisely what impression she was giving to buyers, Bostic stated. It was clear she knew about issues with the Theranos assessments. Holmes knew that the expertise wasn’t working as meant, and that Theranos won’t have the ability to change the world. When that story began to crumble, she tried something she might to attempt to maintain it collectively.
“We admire individuals who set formidable targets and got down to obtain them,” Bostic stated. “As an alternative, we see a CEO of an organization so determined for fulfillment, so afraid of failure, that she was keen to do something to maintain that firm from failing.”
However within the closing arguments of her trial for fraud, which wrapped up Friday, her protection legal professional Kevin Downey additionally advised a narrative. This story was a couple of well-meaning CEO who trusted what consultants advised her, who didn’t learn about issues at her firm, and who couldn’t be faulted if folks misinterpreted the issues she advised them about Theranos. It relied on undercutting the origin story so as to persuade the jury that she wasn’t responsible of the costs in opposition to her.
To seek out her responsible of these prices — wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud — the jury has to imagine Holmes meant to offer folks deceptive details about what the Theranos expertise might do. That intent issues, Downey harassed by his closing arguments.
Determining that intent takes getting inside Holmes’ head in the course of the occasions she lied or stated issues that could possibly be deceptive. When Holmes advised buyers and reporters that the Theranos units might run a whole bunch of correct assessments, Downey stated she really was referring to what the corporate was going to have the ability to do sooner or later, on future iterations of the Theranos machine.
And when Holmes advised investor Bryan Tolbert, vp of finance for Texas-based Corridor Group, that the corporate was “doing plenty of work” with the army, she didn’t imply that Theranos units have been actively in use within the army — simply that the corporate was working in the direction of that aim. (Buyers say Holmes advised them the corporate’s units have been utilized in Afghanistan and on medevacs.)
If buyers received the unsuitable thought, properly, that was as a result of they misinterpreted issues, Downey stated. And, even when they did misread issues, that didn’t really matter, he stated. These sorts of statements from Holmes weren’t why buyers determined to offer Theranos cash. Holmes and the issues she stated weren’t really that vital to the choice making course of, Downey stated. Buyers simply cared that Theranos had a partnership with Walgreens. (A number of buyers stated they trusted the tales Holmes advised them about Theranos’ capabilities.)
Holmes additionally couldn’t be answerable for any issues with the Theranos expertise, Downey stated. Different folks have been accountable — like former Theranos lab director Adam Rosendorff. Holmes thought the assessments have been correct. She noticed constructive opinions from glad prospects, and the corporate apologized any time there was an error. She had no motive to suppose there have been any points that she wanted to be involved about, Downey stated. (In truth, Theranos’ scientists repeatedly flagged critical points to Holmes in emails revealed all through the trial.)
Holmes didn’t behave as somebody who had one thing to cover, Downey stated. She employed a high-profile board of administrators — a former secretary of state, a former senator, a retired Marine Corps four-star basic. She allowed folks from drug firms and tutorial establishments to scrutinize her firm’s tech. She gave info to the Meals and Drug Administration. And, when information reviews and a federal investigation discovered issues together with her labs, she doubled down on work to determine what went unsuitable.
“You recognize that on the first signal of hassle, crooks money out, criminals cowl up, and rats flee a sinking ship,” Downey stated. However Holmes was a loyal CEO who believed that her firm was going to vary the world. As an alternative of working, she introduced in consultants to scrutinize the testing program, Downey famous. “Are these the actions of somebody who had been engaged in a conspiracy to defraud folks?”
There are variations of Holmes in all places: there’s the one she supplied in media interviews, those sketched out in podcasts, the one which can be fictionalized within the upcoming Hulu sequence. Over the previous three months, there have been two extra, offered by prosecutors and protection attorneys. Now, these variations go to the jurors. It’s as much as them to resolve which story is the closest to actuality — and if that actuality is prison.
