Elizabeth Holmes Delays Prison Sentence with Last-Ditch Appeal

Elizabeth Holmes, the CEO of Theranos who got caught for lying about their blood-testing product, didn’t have to go to prison on Thursday. Instead, she used the same legal trick that gave her accomplice one more month of freedom.

On Wednesday, lawyers for former Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes told a U.S. Judge that she won’t have to go to prison as soon as originally planned. This is because she filed an appeal against the judge’s decision, where he had ordered her to be imprisoned on April 27th.

Elizabeth Holmes has filed an appeal to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and because of that, she won’t have to go to prison anytime soon. In January 2022, a jury sentenced her guilty for four counts of fraud and conspiracy which resulted in her fall from being famous in Silicon Valley to someone who scammed investors and endangered people’s health with faulty medical tests.

Holmes copied a move that her old boyfriend and helper, Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani, did to dodge the need of going to prison on March 16. Later when the Ninth Circuit disapproved of this, Davila gave an order that Balwani must go to prison on April 20 instead. Balwani was then found guilty of 12 charges related to fraud and conspiracy, and is currently staying in a government jail located in San Pedro, California. He is supposed to stay there for 13 years after his conviction.

Holmes and Balwani were both in trouble with the law for deceiving people about Theranos’ blood-testing system. The company had claimed it was a big breakthrough in health care, which made it popular and they received almost one billion dollars from investors!

Lynne Holmes, who is 38 years old, recently went to court after giving birth to her second child. She asked the judge called ‘Davila’ if she could remain free until she appeals her conviction. ‘Davila’, however, rejected her request and said that Lynne had betrayed Silicon Valley by committing crimes.

Davila wanted Holmes to be sent to a prison camp that is not very strict in Bryan, Texas. However, they still haven’t said if that’s where she will stay while doing her sentence.

The same day it was announced that someone who helped put Holmes in jail is leaving their job, it was also revealed that Holmes made a legal move. Jeffrey Schenk, the person responsible for helping convict Balwani too, will be working at Jones Day law firm taking cases of people accused of financial crimes.