Elizabeth Holmes sentenced to over 11 years in prison following fraud conviction

Elizabeth Holmes
FILE – Former Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes arrives at federal court in San Jose, Calif., on Oct. 17, 2022. A federal judge on Friday, Nov. 18, will decide whether Holmes should serve a lengthy prison sentence for duping investors and endangering patients while peddling a bogus blood-testing technology. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu, File)

Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes was sentenced to more than 11 years in prison on Friday, about two years after a four-month trial in front of a jury made up of eight men and four women.

Holmes was originally charged for misleading investors about the efficacy of her blood-testing technology startup.

The onetime billionaire was convicted of four counts of wire fraud in January, and on Friday, she received a 135-month sentence, according to CNBC.

Holmes made lofty claims about Theranos’s blood-testing technology, asserting that it could perform several diagnostic tests with only one drop of blood. At the time, the Stanford dropout was heralded as the next Steve Jobs, whom she admired and modeled herself after.

She eventually attracted several major figures, including media mogul Rupert Murdoch and former Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, to invest in Theranos. Former Secretaries of State Henry Kissinger and George Shultz also sat on the company’s board.

Despite her awareness of several defects with Theranos’s product, Holmes did not inform investors, prosecutors argued during her trial.

Theranos’s former chief operating officer Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani, who was in an undisclosed relationship with Holmes for 10 years, is set to be sentenced next month, CNBC reported.

Balwani was found guilty of 12 criminal fraud charges in July. Holmes has also accused Balwani of rape.

Tags Betsy DeVos Elizabeth Holmes Elizabeth Holmes fraud Henry Kissinger Rupert Murdoch Rupert Murdoch sentencing Steve Jobs Theranos

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