[HN Gopher] Elizabeth Holmes found guilty
___________________________________________________________________
Elizabeth Holmes found guilty
Author : sdan
Score : 1627 points
Date : 2022-01-04 00:23 UTC (22 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.axios.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.axios.com)
| olliej wrote:
| So... just defrauding the rich investors, nothing on the people
| who's blood she claimed to be testing.
| adventured wrote:
| She didn't significantly injure those people - she misled
| consumers about the technology but not the results. They did
| the actual testing on other legitimate machines.
|
| The wire fraud charges were by far the much better target.
| olliej wrote:
| They used legitimate machines, but were among other things
| watering down the samples and using lower volumes of blood
| than necessary for correct and accurate operation.
| rossdavidh wrote:
| The fraud was easier to pin on Holmes as a person, rather than
| Theranos as a company.
| 666lumberjack wrote:
| Beta on how long it is before Elon Musk is in the same position?
| NikolaeVarius wrote:
| Count one of conspiring to commit wire fraud against investors in
| Theranos between 2010 and 2015: Guilty. Count two of
| conspiring to commit wire fraud against patients who paid for
| Theranos's blood testing services between 2013 and 2016: Not
| guilty. Count three of wire fraud in connection with
| a wire transfer of $99,990 on or about Dec. 30, 2013: No verdict.
| Count four of wire fraud in connection with a wire transfer of
| $5,349,900 on or about Dec. 31, 2013: No verdict.
| Count five of wire fraud in connection with a wire transfer of
| $4,875,000 on or about Dec. 31, 2013: No verdict.
| Count six of wire fraud in connection with a wire transfer of
| $38,336,632 on or about Feb. 6, 2014: Guilty. Count
| seven of wire fraud in connection with a wire transfer of
| $99,999,984 on or about Oct. 31, 2014:Guilty. Count
| eight of wire fraud in connection with a wire transfer of
| $5,999,997 on or about Oct. 31, 2014: Guilty. Count
| nine was dropped. Count 10 of wire fraud in
| connection with a patient's laboratory blood test results on or
| about May 11, 2015: Not guilty. Count 11 of wire
| fraud in connection with a patient's laboratory blood test
| results on or about May 16, 2015: Not guilty. Count
| 12 of wire fraud in connection with a wire transfer of $1,126,661
| on or about Aug. 3, 2015: Not guilty.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| klohto wrote:
| These are big wins! Some huge sums up there. How many years is
| she looking at?
| paxys wrote:
| Technically 20 years per count, but realistically not too
| many. White collar crimes are anyways not punished very
| strictly, and she's a new mother on top of that. She'll
| negotiate a short term at some country club prison.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| There are really no "country club prisons" in the US
| anymore.
|
| Yes, there are minimum security prison camps for first
| time, non violent offenders, which seems entirely
| appropriate, but a day spa it aint.
| [deleted]
| rrdharan wrote:
| "What it's really like inside 'Club Fed' prisons":
|
| https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/reliable-
| source/wp/2015/...
| NikolaeVarius wrote:
| 20 years per count
| Symmetry wrote:
| That's the maximum possible the judge could decide to give.
| It bears little relationship to what the federal sentencing
| guidelines will actually suggest or the judge will deliver.
|
| https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-
| sentenc...
| Ostrogodsky wrote:
| beamatronic wrote:
| BobbyJo wrote:
| Racial and gender disparities are real, but against the
| 'rich' part in this case...
|
| In any case, she'll definitely do time. You're forgetting
| the victims in this case are not only also rich, but
| probably vastly better connected since they have yet to
| steal from their friends.
| Ostrogodsky wrote:
| > Racial and gender disparities are real, but against the
| 'rich' part in this case...
|
| Sorry I didnt understand what you meant here.
| BobbyJo wrote:
| Saying she'll get off because she's white, a woman, and
| rich is like saying your car stalled because your tires
| were low, you had groceries in the back seat, and your
| engine hadn't had its oil changed in 18 years.
|
| That make more sense?
|
| Edit: I'm saying being white and being a woman helps, but
| being rich helps such an astronomically huge amount more
| emphasizing anything else feels less like informing and
| more like baiting.
|
| Not sure how that wasn't crazy clear.
| Ostrogodsky wrote:
| No, I am more confused now.
|
| Are you saying white, rich people and women dont get
| preferential treatment in the US justice system?
| zls wrote:
| Reads to me like "being rich only helps if the people on
| the other side are materially less rich".
|
| edit: wow, reading gp's "clarification" below, I was way
| off
| BobbyJo wrote:
| You were correct. I made two separate points. You were
| true to the second, and I clarified the first below.
| connicpu wrote:
| That the fact she defrauded people richer than her will
| override any slight advantages her race or gender may
| have provided her in sentencing
| jcranmer wrote:
| I'm not an expert in US sentencing guidelines, but a quick
| crack at the sentencing guidelines calculator [1] suggests
| ~97-121 months, or about 8-10 years.
|
| [If you're not familiar with sentencing, the basic procedure
| is this:
|
| 1. Compute an 'offense level' for each count. For counts that
| are strongly related (which all of these likely are), combine
| by taking the maximum offense level. If they're not related,
| it's more complicated (not simply adding them up).
|
| 2. Compute a 'criminal history level'. For Holmes, that's
| basically "no criminal history."
|
| 3. Adjust for things like the convicted person's remorse or
| cooperation with investigators.
|
| 4. Look up a table that maps offense and criminal history to
| an actual sentencing range.
|
| 5. Adjust that (primarily, but not exclusively, in the
| previously output range) based on the judge's feelings.]
|
| [1] https://www.sentencing.us/
| busymom0 wrote:
| Apparently the "No verdict" might get declared a mistrial on 3
| counts.
|
| For those unaware John Carreyrou played a major role in
| exposing Holmes. His book is a good read: Bad Blood and host of
| Bad Blood: The Final Chapter
|
| https://twitter.com/JohnCarreyrou/status/1478158063379042304
|
| > And the judge will probably declare a mistrial as to the 3
| counts they couldn't reach consensus on.
|
| > The 4 guilty counts are all investor counts. The investor
| conspiracy count and the counts relating to the hedge fund PFM,
| the ex Cravath attorney Mosley and the DeVos family.
|
| EDIT: Mistrial only on those 3 counts which got no verdict, not
| the full trial. Also this is only if the Feds want to do it or
| now which will also depend upon how many years Holmes gets as
| well as if she just decides to plead guilty on those 3 charges.
| celticninja wrote:
| Why would a mistrial be declared? Does that prevent a future
| prosecution of these charges?
| [deleted]
| VWWHFSfQ wrote:
| It will likely result in a new trial of those counts.
| kadoban wrote:
| It will depend on if the prosecutor thinks it's worth it.
| Often it won't be if they already got a guilty on enough
| counts to add up.
| paxys wrote:
| If the prosecution decides to pursue it. They may very
| well decide that finding her guilty on 4 of 11 counts
| sends a strong enough message.
| Kranar wrote:
| It's not about sending a message, it's that the sentence
| will almost certainly be carried out concurrently. That
| means even if she is found guilty of the remaining counts
| it won't result in any additional time served.
| passerby1 wrote:
| Did Theranos blood test work?
| celticninja wrote:
| No. The very fact this trial occurred is testament to that
| fact.
| mulmen wrote:
| That's not how the presumption of innocence works.
| celticninja wrote:
| She wasn't being tried on the technology. The technology
| had failed, the issue is she knew it didn't work and told
| people it did to get their money. If the technology
| worked then even if the business failed with huge losses,
| there was no fraud.
|
| The presumption of innocence in this case, is that she
| did not mislead Investors.
| alisonkisk wrote:
| [deleted]
| VWWHFSfQ wrote:
| My understanding is that it worked in the sense that the
| results were accurate. But the results were gotten by means
| other than what the investors/customers thought. So the end-
| user patients really had no claim since they got correct
| results. But the companies and investors got scammed bigtime.
| teraflop wrote:
| I haven't been following the trial closely, but I spent a
| bit of time skimming through some of the case documents a
| while back. The government's allegations included a bunch
| of supporting statements from doctors, who claimed that
| Theranos frequently gave their patients wildly inaccurate
| results. It sounds like they weren't able to convince the
| jury of Holmes' guilt on those charges.
|
| (IIRC, Holmes' lawyers also made the argument that it was
| not legally possible for her to have committed wire fraud
| against the patients, because any money that Theranos
| received would have come from their insurance companies.)
|
| Part of the difficulty is that the empirical data that
| would have proven how well (or poorly) the technology
| worked was allegedly stored in a proprietary, bespoke
| database. When Theranos was ordered to turn over the data
| to the feds for discovery, they delivered an encrypted
| copy, and then claimed that the encryption key was lost and
| the original disk arrays were unrecoverable. Both sides of
| the case then blamed each other for destroying the last
| remaining copy of the data, which made for some fun
| reading.
| new299 wrote:
| They appear to have used commercial equipment for some of
| their tests, but they appear to have diluted sample until
| the results were no longer valid.
|
| Here's one report on an invalid pregnancy test:
|
| https://www.theverge.com/2021/9/21/22687026/theranos-
| patient...
| exdsq wrote:
| This is wrong. I read Bad Blood by John Carreyrou a few
| years ago and it mentions there were a lot of false results
| due to mishandling the blood samples (watering them down to
| run enough tests etc). I recommend the book if you're
| interested in the case.
| VWWHFSfQ wrote:
| > there were a lot of false results due to mishandling
| the blood samples
|
| This doesn't hold with what was found in the trial. She
| was found not guilty on those counts. Just because a dude
| wrote it down in a book doesn't mean it's true. And the
| legal process found it to be, in fact, not true.
| teraflop wrote:
| That's not what a "not guilty" verdict means.
|
| The jury didn't find that the results given to the
| patients were accurate. They found that Holmes was not
| personally, criminally culpable for wire fraud in those
| cases. Wire fraud is a crime that has very specific
| elements, well beyond the question of how accurate the
| test results were.
| exdsq wrote:
| That dude was the journalist who brought Theranos down,
| and if this was false Theranos wouldn't have failed
| overnight like it did.
| compiler-guy wrote:
| The vast majority of results were not only not accurate,
| couldn't possibly have been accurate given the methods they
| were using to conduct the tests. This is well documented. I
| suggest John Carreyrou's book, _Bad Blood_, which gets into
| great detail on this.
| VWWHFSfQ wrote:
| Once again, just because some dude wrote it down in a
| book doesn't mean it's a fact. The jury just acquitted
| her of those charges. Maybe they didn't the read dude's
| book?
| compiler-guy wrote:
| The jury made no judgements as to the efficacy of the
| tests. In fact, both the prosecution and the defense
| stipulated that the Theranos project was a failure. The
| defense even stated that "Failure is not fraud." The
| question before the jury was whether or not she had
| defrauded investors.
|
| They decided that she had.
|
| FWIW, every single firm that had medical expertise
| declined to invest in Theranos. They could see it had
| extremely minimal chance of success.
| jcranmer wrote:
| Short answer: "no."
|
| Longer answer: Theranos never really got their own custom
| machines working. Until those machines were working, they did
| use other machines and processes which did work. However,
| their entire shtick was trying to do a lot of tests on less
| blood than usual, so... they simply diluted the blood samples
| to get enough volume for those machines to function in the
| first place, and correspondingly, the results were absolute
| garbage. Effectively, they were using working machines
| incorrectly to cover up for their non-working machines.
| 4rt wrote:
| I think it goes further than that, the point is that
| scientifically the tests could never have worked.
|
| Carreyrou originally got tipped off by pathologists saying
| that this was impossible, then they got sued into oblivion
| (see thepathologyblawg).
|
| (IANAP but this is my understanding)
|
| Some real tests rely on having a huge blood sample (e.g.
| 100ml), being filtered (e.g. by centrifuge) and then a test
| of a known sensitivity applied.
|
| Theranos claimed that their tests were more sensitive so
| could work with smaller samples. Statistically this doesn't
| work because with a finger-prick test (e.g. 1ml) the sample
| is 100x less likely to contain the target cells - cells are
| integers.
|
| Additionally finger-prick tests contain only capillary
| blood - they're filtered by the finger blood vessels only
| allowing tiny cells - some of the Theranos tests claimed
| they could detect markers that only exist in arterial and
| venous blood.
| jcranmer wrote:
| My understanding is that the tests that Theranos actually
| ran on patients' blood was actually based on drawing
| blood from the veins, not the finger-prick test. While
| Theranos did want to do the finger-prick tests--and it
| wouldn't have worked for the reasons you mentioned--that
| they didn't get them working meant they couldn't get
| certification for actually running those tests. So they
| ran the tests they did get certification for (which was
| using venous blood draws), for the most part, but even
| then, they were running tests in ways that violated the
| procedures they were supposed to be using.
|
| (I do realize that keeping track of how precisely
| Theranos was lying can be frustrating, since they were
| doing multiple levels of lying here.)
| nmz wrote:
| There's a podcast called bad blood that goes into detail how
| little it worked.
| alisonkisk wrote:
| jameson wrote:
| What an odd sums of money ending with 9s. Does anyone know why
| such numbers were picked?
| phonon wrote:
| Because someone says "I'll invest $100,000,000" and it's not
| evenly divisible by the share price.
| ShamelessC wrote:
| What are you talking about?
| jameson wrote:
| Count six of wire fraud in connection with a wire transfer
| of $38,336,632 on or about Feb. 6, 2014: Guilty.
| Count seven of wire fraud in connection with a wire
| transfer of $99,999,984 on or about Oct. 31, 2014:Guilty.
| Count eight of wire fraud in connection with a wire
| transfer of $5,999,997 on or about Oct. 31, 2014: Guilty.
| tevon wrote:
| The $38m one likely has to do with share count or funds.
|
| Often shares will be split %-wise between two or more
| funds. I.e. 22.5% goes to XYZ Fund 1, 85.5% goes to XYZ
| Fund 2. These % can be super specific and make it so
| wires go down to the cent.
| kadoban wrote:
| Round number minus various transfer fees maybe?
| skzv wrote:
| It's probably minus the wire fee, so you can round up.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| Don't know all of the details behind each count, but glad to
| see this result, which seems good and fair. Basically, looks
| like the majority of "committing fraud against investors"
| charges were guilty, but the "committing fraud against
| _patients_ ", which always seemed like more of a stretch to me,
| were not guilty.
| bryan0 wrote:
| I feel the exact opposite. The investors that actually did
| their due diligence ran away from Theranos. I feel no
| sympathy for the investors that bought into it. I do however
| feel tremendous sympathy for the patients that received
| erroneous test results.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| Sympathy has nothing to do with it. The fact that the
| defrauded investors didn't do more due diligence also has
| nothing to do with it. The question when it comes to
| _fraud_ is whether Holmes _intentionally_ deceived the
| defrauded party, and was that defrauded party harmed
| (again, I 'm not a lawyer, just my understanding). With the
| investors that was clearly an unambiguous yes. With
| patients it's much more of a gray area on both the
| "intentionally" point and the "were they actually harmed"
| point.
| shmatt wrote:
| Can you expand? Investors are risk-heavy VCs who expect more
| than 50% of investments to fail
|
| Patients just saw a blood testing service promising the same
| accuracy as a blood draw and went for it
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| I am not a lawyer, this is just my rationale:
|
| Holmes clearly lied to investors, and even if she may have
| "believed" in the long term prospects of her company, she
| also clearly _intentionally_ lied to investors to get their
| money. The investors were also obviously harmed (they lost
| their money). Also, the fact that VCs expect a lot of their
| companies to fail is totally irrelevant. VCs (and more
| importantly, the law) also expect founders to tell the
| truth on simple statements of fact, e.g. "We recieved this
| much revenue" or "This machine can perform X, Y, Z tests
| _now_ ". Again, Holmes didn't just exaggerate or say "This
| machine can perform X, Y, Z tests _in the future_ ". She
| flat out lied about the current capabilities of her
| company.
|
| With patients, most of the tests were done on standard
| equipment. I don't believe patients were ever told "we will
| test your blood on Edison", and more importantly, they
| probably wouldn't have cared that much - they just wanted
| their test results. So with the tests done on standard
| equipment, hard to argue there was much harm done there.
|
| Now, some tests _were_ done on Edison, and I know Walgreens
| invalidated a whole bunch of Theranos tests. But even then,
| it 's harder to say Holmes _intended_ to deceive in that
| case (a prerequisite for the fraud charge) - presumably
| they chose to run them on Edison and not the other
| equipment because they thought Edison could handle those
| tests. The fact that the lab was sloppy, the fact that
| Edison had issues, that in my mind wouldn 't be enough to
| assert _wire fraud_ on the part of Holmes. All in all it 's
| just kind of hard to say that patients were really
| defrauded at all. If Theranos had instead just completely
| made up some of their test results, and Holmes directed
| that behavior, then yes, that would have been fraud against
| patients, but that's not what happened.
| AdamN wrote:
| I might be wrong but my understanding is that the patients'
| blood was tested on legit equipment so they did get valid
| results. It just wasn't using the Theranos technology. So
| investors (and Wallgreens) were defrauded because they were
| mislead but the patient experience was valid (since the
| results were correct and from proper equipment).
| bryan0 wrote:
| > I might be wrong
|
| I think you are:
| https://www.theverge.com/2021/9/21/22687026/theranos-
| patient...
| NikolaeVarius wrote:
| Or Not.
|
| https://www.businessinsider.com/theranos-problems-blood-
| test...
| bryan0 wrote:
| Not exactly sure what you are referring to, but this
| seems consistent with my article.
|
| > To use traditional machines, Theranos had to dilute
| some of the smaller samples it collected. It appears that
| Theranos carried out another 60 tests using this method
| in December 2014.
|
| > Some of the potassium results at Theranos were so high
| that patients would have to be dead for the results to be
| correct, according to one former employee. This is
| because, lab experts told The Journal, "finger-pricked
| blood samples can be less pure than those drawn from a
| vein because finger-pricked blood often mixes with fluids
| from tissue and cells that can interfere with tests."
| celticninja wrote:
| I wonder if that was because they used other testing methods
| to check patient samples, so they patient got a result
| regardless of the means by which it was obtained.
| superfrank wrote:
| NAL, but I believe the prosecution would need to prove
| damages.
|
| If, like you said, the patients still got their results,
| the results were correct, and it was only how those results
| were obtained that lead to the patient fraud charges, then
| I think you maybe correct.
|
| Again, I'm not a lawyer, so people should feel free to
| correct me if what I said was wrong.
| bryan0 wrote:
| Patients were affected by inaccurate results:
| https://www.theverge.com/2021/9/21/22687026/theranos-
| patient...
| nmz wrote:
| Still seems like fraud to me, they advertised a single drop
| of blood and they ended up taking blood samples the normal
| method.
| NikolaeVarius wrote:
| And exactly what damage was done, slightly less blood in
| the patient?
| dvhh wrote:
| I think in some case un-necessary and costly procedures
| were performed as some of the test were inaccurate.
| xqcgrek2 wrote:
| Interesting you can tell how much the wire transfer fee was in
| each case. How does it compare to the major crypto exchanges?
| goobergoo wrote:
| Boy, it's all about the wire-fraud, isn't it? The MONEY itself
| seems to have filed this lawsuit.
| Overtonwindow wrote:
| I think it's about wire fraud because the prosecution was
| able to prove she had motive to commit fraud. Whereas with
| the patients, it seems, the jury believed she did not intend
| to cause fraud upon the patients.
| celticninja wrote:
| It's fraud case, so it exists entirely because someone was
| separated from their money illegally. I imagine in part this
| case was brought to protect some of that money through
| insurance, which may pay out if the fraud is proven.
| pers0n wrote:
| She'll probably get 6 months in jail and then another year on
| house arrest.
| rdtwo wrote:
| Why isn't she in jail right now? She's doing at least a few years
| hopefully the full 80 but probably not.
| Voloskaya wrote:
| Sentencing always happens at a later date after conviction to
| leave time for a post trial hearings so that the defence can
| raise their concerns etc.
| cryptica wrote:
| Kind of interesting how she attends court without any makeup and
| with scruffy hair; she looks unrecognizable. I guess this is done
| intentionally to distance herself from her previous identity and
| also her crimes.
| joelbondurant1 wrote:
| madiator wrote:
| In case you haven't read already, I highly recommend reading Bad
| Blood.
| zinekeller wrote:
| CNBC says that "Jury finds Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes
| guilty on four charges in criminal fraud trial" while confirming
| that there's deadlock in three charges:
| https://www.cnbc.com/2022/01/03/jurors-in-holmes-trial-remai...
| causality0 wrote:
| What's the takeaway from this other than "killing people by
| giving phony medical test results is just fine, but don't you
| dare anger the wealthy"?
| PradeetPatel wrote:
| The cynic in me says that this is a master class in stakeholder
| management imo.
|
| It is crucial to understand what is the cost of doing business
| vs what will sink the ship.
| junon wrote:
| That proving some things in court is easier than other things
| and by reducing down nuanced legal systems to "rich bad"
| doesn't help the situation any.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| They may be wrong about the generalized conclusion but "some
| things are harder to prove" is hardly a strong argument
| against their claim in this specific instance.
|
| And just throwing the word "nuance" into a comment doesn't a
| counter-argument make.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| IIRC the notorious gangster Al Capone was done on tax
| evasion, not on his main murder-heavy business.
| Nasrudith wrote:
| You can't intimidate a lack of tax payments for clearly
| possessed wealth. Unlike witnesses and accomplices.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| I think the same approach is now used by German
| authorities against the (mostly Lebanese) "big family
| gangs" (Grossfamilien), that have also proven to be very
| capable of intimidating or killing witnesses, but cannot
| hide their acquired wealth.
| WHA8m wrote:
| It's heartbreaking when people are able to play the
| justice system. It's not necessarily about these exact
| people, but the fact that the system we all put our hopes
| and trust in, can be played.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| Sometimes having your heart broken is simply caused by
| naivete.
| WHA8m wrote:
| Sure. Your statement can stand on its own. It's so
| broadly framed. I'm not sure where you want to go with
| that here specifically. If you want to 'accuse' me of
| naivety, I can assure you I try not to be. But I'm still
| (and I don't want to give that up) involved and care
| about the justice system. So it makes me sad to see it
| fail. But that's not being naive. Maybe 'heart-broken'
| was too strong of a word in this context. idk.
| achow wrote:
| I think Capone did not have any witnesses for his murder-
| heavy business. Here there were plenty.
| bb88 wrote:
| It seems a legal issue was something that RICO fixed in
| 1970.
|
| It was hard to pin down the mob boss to particular
| murder. They could get the lower level hitmen, sure, but
| tying it to the main boss was difficult. Recordings were
| not really a thing back then. Those that did talk were
| killed.
|
| Rudy Giuliani (yes that Rudy Giuliani) had the first
| successful prosecution under RICO in the 1980's.
| kashif wrote:
| Despite this being true, it is important that people are
| prosecuted for the "all" the wrongs they did and not just the
| "easy" ones. It isn't much of a justice system if you can get
| away with "hard to prosecute" crimes.
| Closi wrote:
| As a counterpoint, IMO it's important that people are only
| prosecuted when there is sufficient evidence for a likely
| and safe conviction (otherwise at best we will drag
| everyone through expensive court battles which don't lead
| anywhere, and at worst we will end up with unsafe
| convictions).
| junon wrote:
| This is how false conviction happens, so no. This is not
| the precedent we want to set.
| ajuc wrote:
| Especially when things are hard to prosecute exactly
| because rich people don't care about them.
| nova22033 wrote:
| The only takeaway is that the burden is on the prosecutors to
| prove that she defrauded the patients..and they failed to meet
| the burden.
| afterburner wrote:
| Did you know they only ever got Al Capone on tax evasion? Would
| you draw a similar conclusion in that case, or maybe did the
| effort put into pinning Capone on tax evasion have more to do
| with how he was running a murderous criminal organization for
| many years?
| coldtea wrote:
| > _Did you know they only ever got Al Capone on tax evasion?
| Would you draw a similar conclusion in that case_
|
| Yeah. Gangster?
|
| Police doesn't care or is on the payroll.
|
| The IRS however will get you -- it will only let the very
| rich off.
| [deleted]
| codeflo wrote:
| Isn't Al Capone's tax evasion conviction usually mentioned as
| a bit of a joke? I don't see how anyone can cite it as an
| example of the system working _perfectly fine_.
|
| Ignoring for a moment that this was in a very different era,
| to me, there are only two possible conclusions from this:
|
| (a) The conviction was legitimate. This means that if only he
| had been a bit more thorough about laundering his money, he'd
| have gotten away with organized murder.
|
| (b) The conviction was ultimately politically motivated,
| because it became a public embarrassment that he couldn't be
| convicted of anything. But if the state really wants to get
| rid of someone, a prosecutor will find a way, so they did.
|
| And I seriously don't know which possibility is more
| frightening.
| notch656a wrote:
| (b) is far more terrifying. I'd rather 1000 murderers get
| away than a single case of a prosecutor have that kind of
| discretionary power to fuck over essentially anyone just
| for selective enforcement. The law should be applied
| equally.
| himinlomax wrote:
| Montesquieu:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_is_the_enemy_of_good
| differentView wrote:
| Maybe "pragmatic prosecutors made pragmatic decisions instead
| of satisfying random internet commenters looking for perfect
| justice."
| watwut wrote:
| Maybe that still means there is larger issue in the system
| anyway?
| cies wrote:
| Strawman. He's not advocating perfect justice. He raises
| awareness to something that I also found gut wrenching when
| reading the article: investors (super rich) mattered,
| commoners did not.
|
| Calling that "pragmatic prosecutors made pragmatic
| decisions"... Well. You do you.
| babarock wrote:
| You're making the assumption that Holmes wronged
| "commoners" with malicious intent. As far as anyone can
| tell, this is just an allegation. So either:
|
| 1. you have incredible insight into the inner workings of
| the company. 2. you're joining an online pitchforking mob.
|
| As much as I rejoice seeing a Silicon Valley poster child
| be exposed as a phony and a fraud, I would be very careful
| before jumping to conclusions and asserting with high
| confidence that the court verdict is flawed.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| batmansmk wrote:
| As an american resident, I feel less safe being healed in USA
| after yesterday's judgement. Healthcare should not be just
| business. Food additives, sugar and the obesity crisis, a list
| of 1,300 chemicals used in cosmetics, the Vioxx scandal, the
| opioids crisis and more generally the drug situation, the cost
| of healthcare, tanking life expectancy... The list is long on
| why "healthcare is just business" is not working.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| I bet ill-health and disease really helps to increase the
| GDP... Perversely.
| notch656a wrote:
| If healthcare a business, they should be allowed to operate
| one. Deregulate, eliminate licensing for healthcare
| professionals. Eliminate FDA, DEA, medical board, etc. Fuck
| needing a prescription for antibiotics when I can take a
| strep test at home. I'm totally good with making healthcare a
| business so I can finally have accessible affordable
| healthcare and just straight up import drugs from India or
| whatever for 1/100th the cost.
|
| Course if government wants to keep their crusty paws in it
| and decides it actually isn't just a business, they should
| take some cues from countries with much lower GDP overhead.
| The half-assed system we have is the worst of both worlds.
| VWWHFSfQ wrote:
| Did she kill anybody? I wasn't aware that a hospital full of
| children died because Theranos was doing different lab tests
| than they said they were.
|
| I really just can't find myself caring about some millionaires
| scamming some billionaires. VCs get robbed like this all the
| time. Especially the ones with more money than brains. And I'm
| also not going to lose any sleep if she gets 5 years instead of
| 100. This has been kind of a fun news story to follow the last
| few years but really I think most of the outrage here is
| because the particular demographic of this website doesn't
| really like women like this.
| rtpg wrote:
| You should read bad blood. There are interviews with people
| who had disorders and theranos blood tests gave false
| negatives thanks to that, delaying treatment for a long
| while.
|
| I don't know about everyone but it's reallllly hard to find
| sympathy for somebody who plays fast and loose with peoples
| health like this. She wasn't an arms manufacturer but I don't
| really see the sympathy angle here (especially considering
| how much institutional support she had throughout the
| controversy)
| VWWHFSfQ wrote:
| Oh, the dude's book. Maybe the jury should have read the
| dude's book. Then they wouldn't have acquitted her of all
| the charges related to end-user patients. Maybe because all
| of that was quite overblown anyway.
| coldtea wrote:
| It's ok that people got duped then with what they knew.
|
| But you seem to want to still be duped now, as if
| Theranos still represents some noble promise...
| dbcooper wrote:
| More complete summary from the NY Times:
|
| https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/01/03/technology/elizabeth...
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29789074
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| > Very little is known of Mr. Balwani, including why he is
| called "Sunny."
|
| This might be because Saturday in Hindi and other Indian
| languages is "sunny-var", and the day of the week you are born
| on is a common nickname, in conjunction with "sunny" being an
| easy to pronounce and common English word.
| pkd wrote:
| I am Indian and I've never heard the "day of the week as
| nickname" thing. Nicknames are generally shortened first
| names or (in hindu cases) based on some astrological
| calculations that are too detailed to explain here.
| lkxijlewlf wrote:
| > ... or (in hindu cases) based on some astrological
| calculations that are too detailed to explain here.
|
| I feel cheated. I got my nickname because my baby sister
| couldn't pronounce my name correctly.
| approxim8ion wrote:
| This is absolutely incorrect. Saturday is called "Shani"-var
| (pronounced shunny) after the name for the Hindu god of
| justice [1]. Hindus also map his presence to the planet
| Saturn. Either way, no relation to the name Sunny at all.
| Source: several Indian friends of ages 18-50.
|
| 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shani
| bakul wrote:
| More commonly Shani is the harbinger of bad luck &
| retribution, which is why you'll rarely see any Indian
| origin person named Shani. In a Hindu mythology Shani is
| the elder brother of Yama, the lord of death & justice.
|
| Sometime people named Sunil, such as the cricketer Sunil
| Gavaskar, use Sunny as a nickname.
| approxim8ion wrote:
| Thanks for the follow-up!
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Hmm, I guess I was wrong? I only have the 1 datapoint of
| the Indian friend named Sunny who told me this.
| approxim8ion wrote:
| Hey, maybe it factored into the decision to name them,
| although it's unlikely.
|
| From what I understand, the reasons for picking nicknames
| are quite random. As another commenter mentioned, people
| named Sunil or Sanjeev go by Sunny sometimes, although
| other times it is just picked out of the blue, like with
| Bollywood actor Sunny Deol, whose real name is Ajay. His
| brother Vijay uses the screen name Bobby, by the way.
| Random.
| mherdeg wrote:
| Interesting, and is his birthday Sunday, June 13, 1965?
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I have no idea if it is true in this specific case, just
| from what I know of Indian acquaintances who also go by
| Sunny. Very well could be he picked his own Englishized
| nickname to be Sunny because he was born on a Sunday, or
| any other reason.
| secondaryacct wrote:
| And you d expect they d ask a random Indian in the street
| just it case, as you seem to say, this would be so trivial
| people dont feel the need to explain it.
| kadoban wrote:
| It's usually against the style of news orgs like the NYT to
| guess at things like that, or go from general knowledge
| that may or may not apply.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Yes, I was just posting in a "fun fact" way. I have no
| idea if that is the real reason, and I doubt it is worth
| investigating .
| secondaryacct wrote:
| Well I admit I also never understood the sunny nickname
| and I liked your explanation. Ofc I didnt counter check
| either hehe
| paxys wrote:
| "Sunny" is a common nickname in India but it has nothing to
| do with the day you were born on.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Oh, maybe I interpreted wrong. I do know that was the
| explanation given to me from a friend I have nicknamed
| Sunny.
| [deleted]
| tjpnz wrote:
| The one thing I remember distinctly about Balwani (although I
| can't remember where from) was him boasting about the 100k
| LOC he wrote while at Microsoft. Like it was supposed to be a
| badge of honour or indicator of intellectual prowess.
| dilyevsky wrote:
| Late 2000s early 10s it was common to boast about having
| shipped 100 kloc to the point some companies asked about it
| in interviews
| [deleted]
| xqcgrek2 wrote:
| How much time is she looking at?
| zinekeller wrote:
| NO formal sentencing by Judge Davila yet, including the length
| of imprisonment and fines (technically the judge can overturn a
| jury-declared guilt, however it's very unlikely here).
|
| ("U.S. District Court Judge Edward Davila will sentence Holmes
| at a later date.", according to CNBC.)
| joebob42 wrote:
| Would be curious to here a law-person speculate even if it's
| just a guess.
| busymom0 wrote:
| Not sure but I would be interested in knowing how many years
| people think she deserves?
| black_13 wrote:
| rectang wrote:
| https://www.mercurynews.com/2020/01/14/elizabeth-holmes-
| ther...
|
| > _On Monday, U.S. Department of Justice attorneys responded.
| "Thousands of patients received unreliable blood tests,
| depriving them of money or property, placing their health at
| risk and, in many cases, causing actual harm," prosecutors
| alleged in a filing in U.S. district court in San Jose._
|
| Considering the vast weight of the harms she caused, in a
| "fair" retributive justice system, she would get far worse
| the sentences routinely doled out to typical criminals.
|
| But the US "justice system" is hardly "fair".
|
| Personally, I don't really believe in retributive justice.
| The light sentences afforded to privileged criminals bother
| me, but what bothers me more are the draconian sentences
| received by those of less privilege.
| giantg2 wrote:
| danrocks wrote:
| I agree with the premise here. If she does get 20 years, then
| Sunny Balwani is going to get the chair.
| olliej wrote:
| Yeah, except she defrauded rich people.
|
| Look at the people who went to jail following the housing
| collapse vs the madoff ponzi scheme
|
| Depressingly that seems to be the primary factor in such
| cases.
| [deleted]
| Ostrogodsky wrote:
| paulpauper wrote:
| a single charge can be 20 years. likely the charges will run
| concurrently, so probably less than 10 years if I had to guess,
| which is the cutoff for a minimum security prison.
| peter_retief wrote:
| I would like to buy Theranos, it is a great concept and will be
| possible in the future. How much do they want for the company?
| paulpauper wrote:
| A $100 million wire transfer. Is this literally how people invest
| in start-ups, just wiring huge sums of money to someone they do
| not know , on a promise/hope.
|
| that just seems so reckless on so many levels
| drfuchs wrote:
| Hey, minus the $16 wire-transfer fee. Fair is fair; that's what
| I pay, too.
| brianwawok wrote:
| I laughed at that. Apparently the wire transfer fee part is
| the money is free and clear!!!
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Legal firms for investment often take a 1-2% fee for contract
| work and running the deal. I wonder if the $16 came out of
| their cut
| wmf wrote:
| Nobody invests large amounts in someone they do not know;
| that's why connections and introductions were a key element of
| the case.
| andrewxdiamond wrote:
| There is usually a contract stipulating details, but yes, VCs
| tend to use banks
| seattle_spring wrote:
| I'm honestly very curious as to what better ways you have in
| mind for transferring large sums of money.
| paulpauper wrote:
| big difference between wiring $100 million to Vanguard vs.
| $100 million to fund a blood testing start-up
| dreamcompiler wrote:
| This is not some random Western Union fly-by-night process.
| These are serious bank-to-bank transfers with plenty of
| documentation about who's who on both ends. That documentation
| is required not only by bank policy but by law (e.g. IRS and
| anti-terrorism laws). The fact that the wire transfers are
| highlighted so much in the charges is that they are interstate
| transactions, which makes them federal crimes rather than state
| crimes. Which gives the Feds an excuse to get involved.
| notch656a wrote:
| Refer to Wickard v Filburn. Whether a transaction leaves the
| state doesn't mean dick to interstate commerce clause. The
| interstate commerce is interpreted to mean basically any
| possession/production/consumption of goods regardless if they
| leave the state or even enter commerce. Supreme court decided
| even growing crops for use on animals on your own land is
| interstate commerce.
|
| This is the reason why you can catch a federal charge for
| growing your own pot or making your own machine gun, despite
| it never leaving your property nor any desire or act to enter
| commerce/trade. Even merely _where_ you store your goods for
| personal non-commercial use in your own state is considered
| interstate commerce, a la Gun-Free School Zone Act.
| dreamcompiler wrote:
| Fair enough. But United States v Lopez weakened the Gun-
| Free School Zone Act a bit to require prosecutors to prove
| a link between the gun in question and interstate commerce.
| notch656a wrote:
| In theory it weakened it but in practice it did not.
| Merely creating a good yourself in your own state for
| your own personal non-commercial use is considered
| interstate commerce. See Supreme Court refusing to hear
| Kettler's conviction for buying a suppressor made in the
| same state (the NFA regulating suppressors is
| constitutional through the interstate commerce clause,
| and gun parts made completely in one state for
| consumption in that state are interstate commerce), and
| the many other convictions for home made guns. All
| firearms have interstate commerce legally even if there
| is no link from any practical/physical viewpoint. You
| could pull iron out of the ground underneath your house,
| refine and form it yourself and create your own machine
| shop purely from raw material in your state and then make
| a gun, completely bypassing any trade of a single
| molecule from another state and it would be interstate
| commerce. The requirement for a link is a meaningless
| gesture to ensure the writing of it is constitutionally
| accurate.
| dreamcompiler wrote:
| Wondered about that. I kind of suspected US v Lopez might
| have ended up being just a meaningless formality in
| practice. Thanks for the clarification.
| celticninja wrote:
| There are lawyers and contracts involved. There are people who
| connect the money and the startup,these guys have relationships
| with the money people so there is trust at that level, but
| lawyers for the rest of it.
| missedthecue wrote:
| Would you prefer they deliver it in cash? There are associated
| legal docs you sign, but other than that it's not super
| complicated.
| mNovak wrote:
| The wire transfer is just how the money exchanges hands. There
| would be a contract of some sort defining why that money is
| changing hands, and with what strings attached.
| [deleted]
| travelhead wrote:
| Elizabeth could have saved herself many of these charges by
| telling investors she was pivoting to using 3rd party testing
| devices, reducing the number of tests, and transitioning to a
| business model involving venous blood drawing as a service with
| lower costs and better branding. Instead, she decided to continue
| to lie to investors even though she knew her tech didn't work as
| she represented.
| globular-toast wrote:
| Let's be honest, she probably didn't have a clue what was going
| on. She just stuck to the narrative which became more and more
| distant from a reality she could not grasp.
| zxexz wrote:
| It looks like Balwani's trial is scheduled for next year - is
| there any reason why they would have the two trials so far apart?
| Is this common in cases such as these?
| jen20 wrote:
| I was under the impression that it was set for February of
| _this_ year (2022) per [1]?
|
| [1]:
| https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-14/balwani-s...
| zxexz wrote:
| Ah, looks like they updated the OP article as well - this
| makes more sense!
| paxys wrote:
| They were initially meant to be tried together, but Holmes'
| legal team requested a separate trial because part of their
| strategy was to portray her as abused and controlled by Balwani
| and shift the blame on him. His trial is to start a few weeks
| from now.
| celticninja wrote:
| One reason is that if this trial ended in not guilty on all
| counts they would be unlikely to prosecute a successful case
| against Balwani. they have a stronger hand now and Balwani may
| choose a plea deal before trial now, which the prosecution may
| accept due to today's result.
| latenightcoding wrote:
| Question: could Holmes have avoided all of this by pivoting to
| something else and not losing investors money. It is extremely
| common for startups to exaggerate their tech just to later pivot
| to something else without any repercussions.
| ShamelessC wrote:
| If you have to ask yourself questions like these (as a founder)
| - you may very well end up in jail one day.
| [deleted]
| chansiky wrote:
| Based on what one of the engineers of edison were saying, if
| they could acquire more than a "drop of blood" for analysis,
| they would have been able to get more accurate results.
|
| You might be able to consider that a pivot, since she had been
| saying "drop of blood" the whole time.
|
| It was Holmes' unwavering attitude to imitate Steve Jobs that
| got in the way of her decisions, and I think more than a pivot
| of product, that a pivot away from this ideology could have
| saved Theranos. Willingness to give up on perfect design in
| order to acquire a working engineered product could have made a
| world of a difference.
| bootlooped wrote:
| She did sort of try to pivot.
|
| https://www.wired.com/2016/08/theranos-chance-clear-name-ins...
| neom wrote:
| I followed the case very closely, read the transcripts I could
| find daily etc. What Elizabeth did wasn't far from what many
| many many founders do. This was held to a legal standard, sure,
| but let's be real here... since when was the legal standard the
| SV standard? Is SV really the bastion of morality and legal
| ethics? Is that the new norm, good behaviour? Notably some
| investors refused to participate and iirc Draper basically said
| she flew too close to the sun, but it wasn't fraud. I'm sure
| it's going to be an unpopular opinion but personally if this is
| the new standard, the SEC should have a pretty long list of
| founders to try at this standard. The saddest thing of it all
| to me is that she was onto something, people are having success
| with her ideas today. She should have just not gone to market,
| she should have just quietly refined the tech behind the
| scenes, but as I said, she flew too close to the sun. Tesla and
| uber have literally killed people.
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| > What Elizabeth did wasn't far from what many many many
| founders do.
|
| Hard disagree on that one.
|
| It's certainly _not_ common nor acceptable to knowingly lie
| to investors like Holmes did.
|
| There is nothing normal or common about the type of fraud
| that Holmes perpetuated, despite attempts to downplay or
| normalize it.
|
| > I'm sure it's going to be an unpopular opinion but
| personally if this is the new standard, the SEC should have a
| pretty long list of founders to try at this standard.
|
| Can you name a single one? Or is this just cynical
| speculation?
|
| I've seen a lot of attempts to downplay Theranos' blatant
| fraud as an "everybody does it", but I haven't seen anyone
| calling out other companies who were caught committing fraud
| and everyone, including their investors, just shrugged it
| off. It's not normal.
| neom wrote:
| Of course I can name multiple, I've been involved in
| hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars
| in startups deals, I've spent over 15 years in the
| industry...
| bern4444 wrote:
| Are you willing or can you share the names of some of
| these companies?
| neom wrote:
| No. I don't think what they did was wrong a), and, b)
| because it genuinely is prevalent. Maybe if the statue of
| limitations passed on some of the startups I've been
| involved in, I might consider it, but even then,
| doubtful.. It doesn't matter what was done, the startups
| were successful and the investors got paid back, so who
| is going to ask questions and why?
| seehafer wrote:
| Were any of these startups providing medical care or
| diagnostics to people on false pretenses?
| neom wrote:
| She was found guilty of investor fraud, not
| medical/patient fraud.
| seehafer wrote:
| Your implied question is "why is this case special?",
| when so many startups supposedly do this. Most startups
| aren't giving people input into major medical decisions.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| I mean, on one hand, yes, if nobody is harmed, there
| really isn't a case for fraud.
|
| But I agree with the other responder, I've also been in
| many startups and have certainly seen _tons_ of
| exaggerations about the future but _never_ outright lies
| about the present that Holmes was guilty of. Even worse,
| if you 're going to lie about the present, you should at
| least have strong confidence your lie is _physically
| possible_ - Theranos tech was always a sham from day 1.
|
| I just don't buy at all the "everyone in Silicon Valley
| does it" spiel, because if they did, investors of failed
| startups (i.e. the majority) would have tons of reasons
| to sue and put people in jail.
| lighttower wrote:
| Underrated comment. The investors were investing in her
| because she was willing to take the risk of move fast and
| break things (where things in this case is the diagnostic
| accuracy of blood tests). She got nailed, ironically, not for
| hurting patients, but instead for harming the egos of the
| investors.
|
| As a participant in the startup investment world you are
| willing Participant of SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF. This is
| roughly equivalent speak for REALITY DISTORTION FIELD. The
| point is you as an investor are a willing participant in
| believing that something more is possible than what has
| already been achieved.
|
| If you're a founder: you should be worried about being held
| to a legal standard of the representations and warranties.
| That section is in every share purchase agreement and it's
| the stuff that gets you sued. And sometimes, like in this
| case, it's WIRE FRAUD and it's criminal. Crazy. We need
| another section to replace REPS AND WARRANTIES.
| neom wrote:
| > We need another section to replace REPS AND WARRANTIES
|
| Ain't that the truth. Hand on heart: the number of decks I
| saw last year that have an INSANE 2 page legal disclaimer
| at the start AND finish of the deck is up ~90%, ninety
| percent. I knew people who used this as a signal of an
| inexperienced founder, over night it's the signal of an
| experienced founder.
| dopamean wrote:
| > What Elizabeth did wasn't far from what many many many
| founders do
|
| I'm not sure this is true. She told a lot of egregious lies
| to investors while trying to get money from them. She
| repeated those lies in the press and to anyone who questioned
| it. And I don't mean a lie like lying that your product is
| more effective than it is. I mean she told prospective
| investors about huge contracts with the defense department
| that did not exist. She told investors that her machines were
| being use in the battle field. These were lies that were
| never going to be true.
| neom wrote:
| That's not what she said at all. At least not from the near
| daily coverage and transcripts I watched[1][2][3][4]
|
| She said it was being trialed by the military, in reality
| what had happened was Mattis said he would be able to
| introduce the technology to the military. This type of
| "abstraction" is in very many pitches I've read over the
| years.
|
| [1]https://www.youtube.com/c/LawyerYouKnow
| [2]https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOShJ_GPEegXscrlKWfpwCA
| [3]https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCiWXvA_5bzvOFdbS353Ll-Q
| [4]https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwCqasesYi60fSrOjlUSNzg
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| > She said it was being trialed by the military, in
| reality what had happened was Mattis said he would be
| able to introduce the technology to the military. This
| type of "abstraction" is in very many pitches I've read
| over the years.
|
| That's not an "abstraction". It's a lie, and therefore
| fraudulent.
|
| If you're seeing these sort of lies all over the place,
| you might be in a weird bubble. Startups are known for
| creative wordplay, but if you're straight up lying about
| something happening when it's not happening at all or
| even started, that's fraud.
| TheCondor wrote:
| Whether or not it's "abstraction" really depends on who
| hears it. I don't think it's cool but maybe in a slightly
| more fuzzy area as to if it's a lie.
|
| Surely there would be a contract with the military if
| that was the claim and surely these investors did due
| diligence and audited the contracts, nobody would ever
| get wrapped up in the hysteria and hype and burn a
| billion dollars...
| neom wrote:
| From what I saw from the trial, no one did any real
| diligence at all, except the people who testified they
| didn't invest because they did diligence. The Devos
| family office testimony was.... laughable, what a joke,
| they basically just went off what everyone else said, and
| that has primarily been my experience in startup. If big
| names are involved, people almost ALWAYS do the diligence
| they want to do so that you pass, not so that you fail.
|
| tbqh, I came away from the trial really feeling like the
| investors who testified against her deserved what they
| got because of how they approached the situation. IMO
| Elizabeth Holms isn't some mastermind manipulator, she's
| more akin to a child who was enabled by moronic parents.
| rurp wrote:
| Fortunately the law doesn't have a victim blaming statute
| in these cases, so any mistakes the investors made don't
| excuse Holmes for lying and commiting fraud.
| davidcbc wrote:
| You don't get to commit fraud just because your victims
| should have known better. That's not how the law works
| neom wrote:
| It seems so, as she's going to jail. However, that wasn't
| the crux of my original point. The legal standard and the
| SV standard have been divergent in may circles for quite
| some time. May folks do "take liberties with the truth"
| because your investors _should know better_ - If someone
| went for coffee with 26th US secretary of defense for the
| united states of america and explained how it would be
| useful for the military, and that person said it would be
| and they could easily have the military look at testing
| it, I don 't believe it would be uncommon for a founder
| to then turn around and say to an investor "the military
| is going to be running a test with our equipment", I
| wouldn't _traditionally_ expect then to have the
| possibility of being prosecuted for wire fraud hanging
| over me if my startup failed. That said, _we should all_
| now _expect_ the legal standard is the SV standard. It
| will be interesting to see how it impacts the industry,
| if at all.
| rfw300 wrote:
| > If someone went for coffee with 26th US secretary of
| defense for the united states of america and explained
| how it would be useful for the military, and that person
| said it would be and they could easily have the military
| look at testing it, I don't believe it would be uncommon
| for a founder to then turn around and say to an investor
| "the military is going to be running a test with our
| equipment", I wouldn't traditionally expect then to have
| the possibility of being prosecuted for wire fraud
| hanging over me if my startup failed.
|
| I think the crucial distinction between a slight stretch
| like you describe and what Holmes did is the tense: the
| military is going to test our product vs. the military
| _is_ testing our product (which did not, uh, exactly
| exist then). One is a rosy forecast and the other is just
| a lie.
| neom wrote:
| Feel free to add me on linkedin and share your deal flow!
| I'd genuinely love to see the startups you see and are
| invested in. When I was still in startups, I encountered
| more than one experience where various investors begged
| me to lie to them. In one instance because they wanted
| their IRR higher, and in another because they felt if a
| specific metric was inflated considerably more, it would
| be easier to execute something. I'm not kidding around
| either, that happened.
| dboreham wrote:
| Inflating some metric is one thing. Saying that a thing
| that's impossible by laws of physics, has been done in
| your product is quite another. I do admit however that
| it's not the first time. When I worked in a large tech
| company, our investment arm asked me to look at a startup
| that was clearly the same kind of fraud (doing things
| that are impossible according to Shannon), and indeed did
| turn out to be a fraud. But that's one example in my
| entire career.
| [deleted]
| lbwtaylor wrote:
| >She said it was being trialed by the military, in
| reality what had happened was Mattis said he would be
| able to introduce the technology to the military. This
| type of "abstraction"...
|
| That's pretty far from a fair summary. Mattis made the
| introduction, Holmes could not get past the initial
| military diligence, and killed the project, and yet years
| later continued to represent that it was an important
| part of Theranos' business, to add an imprimatur of
| success and reliability of the testing.
| mdoms wrote:
| You are completely uninformed on the details of the case.
| She absolutely did tell these lies to investors.
| blackoil wrote:
| Are there any public example of the claims you are making?
| hooande wrote:
| No. It's one thing to say "My company is going to change the
| world" or "I am the best president of all time". It's
| different to repeatedly make a claim that is verifiably
| untrue, like "I have perfected cold fusion" or "I have a cure
| for all forms of cancer". The average startup founder doesn't
| do this, no sane person does this.
|
| > "The saddest thing of it all to me is that she was onto
| something, people are having success with her ideas today."
|
| This is a very poorly informed statement. Who bought the
| valuable IP that Theranos spent hundreds of millions of
| dollars developing? No one is "having success with her ideas"
| because the ideas didn't exist. That's why she's going to
| prison
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| Exactly. Many of her ideas are _physically impossible_
| because there is good evidence capillary blood isn 't
| homogeneous enough to give accurate results for
| quantitative tests at the volumes Holmes was touting.
| kstrauser wrote:
| > people are having success with her ideas today
|
| Citation needed. The whole concept has a critical flaw, as
| pointed out by her engineering staff and medical advisors:
| blood tests require a certain minimum volume of blood to
| work, and that's inescapable because blood components are
| discrete, not continuous.
|
| For example, a drop of blood is about .05mL, or about 1/20th
| of a milliliter. A common testing sample size in a normal lab
| is 3mL, or about 60x larger what Theranos claimed they could
| work with. Now, suppose you're testing for some cell that's
| may be present in concentrations of 10 per mL, or 1 per .1mL
| blood volume on average. In a conventional lab, then, you'd
| probably have about 30 of those in the 3mL sample. In a
| Theranos lab, _even if it worked perfectly_ , you're equally
| likely to have either 0 or 1 present in the .05mL sample. In
| other words, you're 50% likely to get a false negative, even
| if the equipment is working perfectly, based purely on the
| tiny sample volume.
|
| By analogy, if you poll 100,000,000 Americans, you might get
| a pretty good idea of an election's result. If you poll 3,
| you have no idea, _even if the poll is perfectly designed_.
| Well, that 's what Theranos was up against.
|
| NB: I'm not a lab tech, and the above is my understanding of
| it. That's my distillation of a lot of articles I read about
| Theranos, such as https://theconversation.com/the-rise-and-
| fall-of-theranos-so... .
| manquer wrote:
| While Theranos claims were absurd , it is not hard to
| believe there is scope for improvements in specific areas
| which is what OP is trying to say I guess.
|
| 1. The premise assumes there are not significant wastage in
| the current processes and those are near optimal. Any non
| optimal paths could potentially benefit from improvements
|
| 2. While there are some tests at that low concentrations
| not all tests have components at that low concentrations.
| Those could certainly be improved ?
|
| 3. Reuse and cross testing the same samples, or testing for
| multiple things at the same time etc, are all areas that
| could yield better outcomes than current standard.
|
| 4. Perhaps it is also possible that while primary marker
| for a test is not present in the sample, its presence in
| the blood could have left other markers that are detectable
|
| I don't know anything about lab testing, if I can think of
| few approaches to solution for the low sample problem.
| Experts may have many other approaches so it shouldn't be
| surprising if there are improvements claimed ?
| hooande wrote:
| Many people are working very hard on solving these
| problems. Holmes simply claimed to have solved them all
| with one machine. They never had any idea of how to
| actually do that, never even tried. It wasn't like "If we
| use this new development in nanotechnology we might be
| able to...". It was just entirely made up, the whole
| time.
|
| If I falsely claim to have invented a warp drive, I don't
| get credit for whatever work people do in that area in
| the future.
| manquer wrote:
| Not exactly how it works. There are lot of brilliant
| people working on lot of good stuff, very few get funding
| to do meaningful work. The job of someone like Holmes is
| to bring that funding.
|
| Holmes was an agent to energize the industry in the sense
| that she was instrument to attracting a lot of new VC
| investors willing to throw money and experiment with new
| tech like this . I doubt she personally claimed to have
| invented anything new, even had Theranos succeeded her
| claim to fame would be only building the organization
| that enabled such innovation and not the innovation
| itself.
|
| Even though Theranos failed as firm, a lot of smart
| people got funding to work on interesting projects while
| there and potentially either developed or started
| developing products because of holmes being able keep
| them and Theranos funded. A lot of new people are getting
| funding, because Theranos and Holmes opened this industry
| to VC funding when it was not traditionally so.
|
| To your example, if you falsely claim to invent a warp
| drive, raise a lot of money, hire a lot of smart people
| who do interesting work while working for you, eventually
| fail as company and those people go on to build parts of
| the drive partly with experience they gained in your
| research. This kind of research was not well funded
| before you, Likely without you this would have never been
| a VC funded industry don't you have some hand in that ?
| hooande wrote:
| Do you think it's easier for people to raise money in the
| blood testing space now after this very high profile
| fraud? I've heard people say that it makes things much
| more difficult.
|
| Also, Holmes's lies sucked up a ton of funding at the
| time. Not just the money given to her, but the investors
| who said "theranos already dominates blood testing, so
| we'll invest in another space"
|
| This was a disaster all around for everyone but her.
| neom wrote:
| >This was a disaster all around for everyone but her.
|
| I don't know how you can say that, some of the trial
| evidence was heart breaking. Some of the emails, the
| texts back and forth between her and Sunny, what a mess,
| it sounded like she was totally losing her mind and
| stressed out to no end while being pushed and cajole by
| an unreasonably intense person behind the scenes. She was
| clearly devastated when the company collapsed, she very
| clearly believed in what she was doing, and now she is
| going to jail. That sound like beyond a disaster, it
| sounds like hell.
| abyssiana wrote:
| Read the comments. Nobody cares how she feels now.
| Everybody cares only about their own opinion they have
| the need to express. For her it's all devastating, for
| resonable people too, for majority of shitty people the
| main thing ia to grow in their own eyes while barking at
| someone else.
| hooande wrote:
| She clearly believed in what? The vision of low cost,
| multi function blood testing? Maybe she did, but she made
| almost no progress toward that goal. All while accepting
| credit for having already accomplished it. Not to mention
| that she's been living the lifestyle of a multi
| millionaire the whole time.
|
| She's a human being and it is a sad situation. But this
| is justice.
| kstrauser wrote:
| True, and there are chemistry tests that would probably
| be reasonably testable. For instance, blood glucose is
| already testable from a finger prick, so that'd be just
| fine. Still, a lot of people with the background to have
| informed opinions have spoken up to say that some of her
| claims weren't possible on a theory basis, not just
| because of an engineering challenge.
| megablast wrote:
| No need to poll 100 million. 20,000 is pretty accurate.
| kstrauser wrote:
| OK, sure, but that doesn't change my point. You _could_
| run all of someone 's blood through a scanner and then
| back into them to get a complete view, but a lab only
| samples a few mL of it.
| dvhh wrote:
| Usually your sample size would be a good indicator of the
| accuracy of your poll/test/experiment.
|
| Of course, like everything it could be biased by the used
| methodology.
| tschwimmer wrote:
| This is a great breakdown and some great analogies.
| 2YwaZHXV wrote:
| One thing that seems to be forgotten or lost in all of
| these armchair analyses is that while it is true that
| something like 3mL of blood is collected for a conventional
| lab test, the machine itself when it runs the test only
| takes a few microliters (maybe 10s of uL, all of this is
| depending on the test of course). The rest is frozen for
| follow-up or repeat testing or used for other tests or just
| discarded after some time.
|
| EDIT: And my favorite part is the first step the Siemens
| machines they used for testing is to "dilute" the part of
| the sample it is going to use (addition of DI water, to get
| the blood to the desired concentration). That is hard-coded
| into the protocol, with a specific dilution amount, and it
| is done for all the official Siemens tests, as well, hah.
| kstrauser wrote:
| According to an article in Nature[1]:
|
| > Holmes described the miniLab as "the most important
| thing humanity has ever built". But at best, the lab
| could do immunoassays using microfluidics. The tiny blood
| sample had to be diluted extensively (for which there are
| no reference standards or precedents), leading to
| artefacts and spurious results.
|
| That (and other reports) sound like they diluted way more
| than usual.
|
| [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-05149-2
| 2YwaZHXV wrote:
| While it is published on their site, it appears to really
| just be a summary of the book by Carreyrou? And I have
| yet to see anyone actually publish any of the dilution
| ratios and compare that to any existing process, so it
| seems like an easy-but-easily-incorrect leap to conclude
| that it is "way more than usual".
| neom wrote:
| https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/11/16/blood-
| s...
|
| Maybe not quite as extravagant a claim as hers, hers was
| def a 100 year vision, but many people are working on and
| having progress in a very similar area. Heck even Tyler
| Shultz the kid who is on the road doing a press tour about
| how "he took down Theranos", is working on a Theranos-esq
| startup.
| miohtama wrote:
| "Scaling too fast" has definitely a better vibe to it than
| "found guilty" :)
| paxys wrote:
| A pivot wasn't necessary. She could have avoided it by
| recognizing when the writing was on the wall for the company
| and working towards a graceful shutdown rather than doubling
| and tripling down on their failures.
| mkl wrote:
| That still would have cost investors most of their
| investment, and probably would have led to this same
| conspiracy and fraud outcome, since she lied to them to get
| their funding well before the company shut down. Maybe she
| could have afforded a bigger/better legal team that way
| though?
| ramesh31 wrote:
| If she gets anything less than life in prison, it will
| effectively answer the question of "how many years of prison
| would you do for a billion dollars?". I'm guessing an absolute
| max of 5 in a minimum security white collar facility.
| rrdharan wrote:
| She didn't personally clear or keep anything close to a billion
| dollars. It's true that she was able to live a somewhat lavish,
| albeit clearly stressful, lifestyle for a while though...
| hnarayanan wrote:
| Like a dozen years!!
| rStar wrote:
| madrox wrote:
| Looking at the Theranos comment history on HN is a journey [1].
| From the very beginning there was a lot of skepticism.
|
| [1]
| https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=30&prefix=false&q...
| reidjs wrote:
| One interesting find from that search, here's two videos of
| Holmes, in the first she fakes a creepy deep voice for the
| entirety of the interview
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YecjzEScXqU&t=105
|
| In this video she is being interviewed on Mad Money, using her
| (assumed) actual voice.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGfaJZAdfNE&t=403
|
| What a strange person.
| Andrew_nenakhov wrote:
| I never could understand why people pay so much attention to
| her voice. It's not that deep, I've known plenty of females
| with voice deeper than what you call 'creepy deep voice'.
| Such voice is not that rare and definitely not creepy, just
| voice.
|
| Also some throat infections can temporarily make the voice
| lower.
| globular-toast wrote:
| It's not about how deep it is. It's about it being fake.
| mullsie wrote:
| VWWHFSfQ wrote:
| So she was found guilty on 4 charges. Not guilty on 4 charges.
| And no verdict on the remaining 3 charges. So does she have to
| get another trial on the remaining 3?
| gpm wrote:
| Not an expert, but I believe no verdict usually means "not
| guilty but the prosecutor can try again if they want to".
|
| Considering she was found guilty on 4, it's not obvious that
| they will bother.
| rossdavidh wrote:
| I wonder if they get to hear what the sentence is before they
| decide on the remaining 3?
| rvz wrote:
| It has been definitively admitted. Now we see the vultures
| tearing this fraudster apart and you what? That
| is good, and it is absolutely magnificent.
|
| Since many have gotten away with it, She is now the first of many
| that have been caught and need to be investigated and the other
| exit scams of this decade to be unveiled before the scammers race
| to the exit with a mountain of cash.
|
| So who is next?
| celticninja wrote:
| If the global economy doesn't pick up soon we may see many more
| exposed. But next up I think wi be the Wirecard trial in
| Germany, if they find someone to prosecute
| globalise83 wrote:
| They have Markus Braun, ex-CEO, in 'Untersuchungshaft' / on
| remand in Augsburg, near Munich. He has been there for 1.5
| years and will probably be prosecuted this year. In addition,
| around 30 Wirecard associates are being investigated[0]. Of
| course The One That Got Away, and likely prime instigator,
| Jan Marsalek, is oresently in an unknown location with a lot
| of money on his hands.
|
| [0]
| https://www.tagesschau.de/wirtschaft/unternehmen/wirecard-
| ch...
| celticninja wrote:
| It was Jan Marsalek I was meaning, thank you for the
| information. If going into hiding is your response to the
| issue then you must be pretty sure of your own guilt.
| gameswithgo wrote:
| I wonder what parallels we can draw between Holmes and her blood
| testing, with Elon and full self driving. I suppose Elon has
| covered his bases by saying it is still a work in progress while
| charging for it, but he has also been saying it will be ready in
| about a year or two since 2016.
|
| I think the FSD research Tesla is doing is interesting, but man I
| would rather all of that money gone into a carbon fiber roof or
| something on my model 3 instead!
| Aperocky wrote:
| There's no parallel, self driving cars is technically feasible.
|
| Meanwhile Theranos bloodtests suffer from scientific
| impossibility: you can't get information from where there is
| none. And when the information is sparse, you'll have to spend
| greater entropy to get it (versus the tiny machine that
| theranos built).
| forgot-my-pw wrote:
| It's not just about what's technically feasible. He's making
| false promises every year and now released to public a Beta
| product that should have been Alpha or earlier stage.
| druadh wrote:
| The progress made on full self driving (FSD) has been quite
| transparent, at least compared to Theranos. I worked at Tesla
| from 2017 - 2019 and the quality of Enhanced Autopilot probably
| quadrupled in the that small amount of time. I left before
| being able to experience the progress made on FSD,
| unfortunately.
|
| I agree that Elon's timeline's are absolute BS. My perspective
| on his timelines are that they are almost meant more for his
| employees (throughout all his companies) to try and shorten the
| time it takes to 'achieve the impossible'. For example,
| something that most industry folks would think will take 20-30
| years (or is feasibly impossible ie. reusable rockets), Elon
| gives a 5 year timeline and his team actually gets it done in
| 10 -- still less time than anyone thought possible.
|
| I'm excited to see what kind of progress is made on FSD once
| the DOJO supercomputer is built out and put to work (another
| item with an unrealistic timeline, I've no doubt).
|
| Just my two cents. Enjoy your Model 3!
| giantrobot wrote:
| > For example, something that most industry folks would think
| will take 20-30 years (or is feasibly impossible ie. reusable
| rockets), Elon gives a 5 year timeline and his team actually
| gets it done in 10 -- still less time than anyone thought
| possible.
|
| No one realistically thought reusable rockets were impossible
| or even infeasible. Reusable rockets trade lift capacity for
| reusability. A single-use Falcon 9 lifts more than a reusable
| one because it can use all the fuel in the first stage for
| lift saving nothing for landing. Keep in mind the Space
| Shuttle (a reusable rocket) had been flying for thirty years
| before Space X landed a Falcon 9.
|
| Space X has done cool things but they _are_ iterative
| developments. Tesla didn 't invent electric cars or do
| something impossible, they iterated on existing technologies.
| They, like Space X, have happily and readily accepted every
| government subsidy dollar they're remotely qualified to
| receive. All while Musk is bitching about paying taxes.
| druadh wrote:
| > No one realistically thought reusable rockets were
| impossible or even infeasible.
|
| Not addressing the point of my comment here ^, but why
| didn't anyone else do it if it was feasible and possible?
| And how long would it have taken an agency like NASA to
| actually start and complete the project?
|
| > Keep in mind the Space Shuttle (a reusable rocket) had
| been flying for thirty years before Space X landed a Falcon
| 9.
|
| Wasn't the space shuttle a glider with rockets strapped to
| the bottom? It was not a reusable rocket, it was a reusable
| shuttle.
|
| > Space X has done cool things but they are iterative
| developments. Well, everything in the human existence is an
| iterative development, so I don't understand what you're
| trying to say other than to downplay other peoples'
| accomplishments.
|
| https://youtu.be/mY-fSnKTLqw?t=111 <-- anyone could do it
| if they felt like it, right?
| irthomasthomas wrote:
| It is akin to Heinz trying to reuse and refill their cans
| of beans. Rocket engines are big disposable tin cans
| carrying very expensive beans.
| ljp_206 wrote:
| Theranos' marketing promise/demo was a small box that
| supposedly ran a number of usually laborious blood tests on a
| drop of blood. That box actually returned pre-programmed
| results, or just ran tests using traditional equipment.
|
| With this, we can imagine scenarios that would be comparable
| for a Tesla, or any othet tech startup. It seems relatively
| safe to say that Tesla's FSD doesn't just pipe out the
| computation to a competitor or something, so by this thought
| experiment, it at least has that going for it.
|
| There's moonshot, and then there is farce. Theranos was
| farcical, but someone might do it some day. Tesla, at the very
| least, still has chances to deliver.
| thehappypm wrote:
| Consider the James Webb Space Telescope. Are the engineers
| working on it frauds because it's been delayed for years? No,
| they have legitimately been trying their best despite
| leadership committing to dates.
|
| Theranos would be if JWST took taxpayer dollars and launched a
| non working telescope and sent back fake images.
|
| Tesla with FSD is a lot more like the JWST being delayed, or
| perhaps if they launched a stripped down version to space and
| then delayed the real thing.
| shawabawa3 wrote:
| It depends on whether Tesla/Elon actually believe they can
| deliver FSD.
|
| It would be fraud if internally they knew FSD was not
| possible on their hardware but they continued advertising
| that it was (I'm not suggesting this is the case, just saying
| there is a world where Tesla's FSD claims are fraud)
| boc wrote:
| Except the JWST isn't going to fly through my windshield at
| 80 miles an hour on 280 if it doesn't end up working
| perfectly.
| irthomasthomas wrote:
| "FDA has concluded that the Theranos test and technology is
| eligible for waiver under CLIA. The waiver means FDA determined
| the Theranos test and technology is reliable and accurate..."
|
| That aged well.
| https://web.archive.org/web/20160320011355/https://www.thera...
| josho wrote:
| This exposes the weaknesses in our current system. From the
| article "Theranos provided data". Science is about
| reproducibility. Evidently the FDA isn't responsible for
| reproducing the science from companies and instead takes them
| at their word.
|
| I think it shows that generally speaking our regulatory bodies
| need to evolve. They need a quality control program that
| periodically audits the information provided to them and
| conduct their own independent review/replication of the
| experiments. If reproducibility isn't possible then severely
| punish companies that are found to be misrepresenting their
| data.
| habanany wrote:
| peter_retief wrote:
| I believe what they proposed is possible but they were unable to
| deliver not being technical founders. If they had been technical
| founders they would have promised a product that could be
| delivered. This all besides the ethical issues of faking blood
| tests!
| LongTimeAnon wrote:
| hffft wrote:
| nerevarthelame wrote:
| Here's the earliest HN submission I could find on Theranos:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6349349
|
| I don't really blame folks for not calling it out as a fraud at
| that point, given how little information we had. There were, for
| what it's worth, a number of people who complained about the
| ambiguity of the website. But many were convinced that the
| illustrious board must mean good results.
|
| Well done to medman77 who had the most direct rebuke: "The
| company is all hot air. They have a board full of retired
| military figure heads that have no experience in medical devices
| or retail services. Additionally, they do not have any products
| to show. Look at their patents. They are all very general and
| broad. There has been NO FDA CLEARANCE for anything they are
| doing, which raises legal questions. Speaking of legal, search
| for lawsuits they are involved in. Their core technology is not
| even theirs. They stole it from someone else."
| [deleted]
| hooande wrote:
| this old thread is so hn. lots of discussion about famous names
| on the board, mentions of threats to privacy and discussion of
| the website ui.
|
| medman77 did crush it with actual technical analysis, among
| others. now I want to go back and see what hn said about other
| famous companies
| zeusk wrote:
| I find it odd/funny that it was the only comment from his
| account since 2013
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I recall lots of doubt about Theranos from the beginning,
| especially due to the board composition.
| sk5t wrote:
| There was also a lot of scientific doubt about Theranos
| based on what is actually physically present in a drop of
| capillary blood.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Yes, I recall that too from multiple posters who claimed
| they had worked with blood and anyone who had experience
| in that space was highly suspect of the claims due to
| inconsistency with current knowledge of limitations.
|
| Basically, barring any miraculous discovery, it was all
| bullshit and Theranos did not seem to have anyone on
| their roster capable of delivering a miraculous
| discovery.
|
| But the board being extra stacked with political power
| was also seen as a blatant attempt to deflect from not
| having anything real to show in their product.
| throwawaylinux wrote:
| I also recall a lot of bullishness especially due to the
| board. The idea of getting in on war profiteering and
| inflated government contracts made a lot of mouths water.
| MarcelOlsz wrote:
| My favourite[0] is the dropbox post.
|
| [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863
| JimDabell wrote:
| I think it's worth highlighting dang's comment on that one
| - it's not as bad as it seems:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27068148
| nerdponx wrote:
| I enjoyed the comment by dlisboa:
|
| > So, it's a health testing company that will keep all my
| blood-related health information and make it "actionable", with
| the backing of James Mattis, William Perry and none other than
| Henry Kissinger. There are more soldiers in that board there
| than doctors.
|
| > The only way I'd give them my blood would be to infect them
| with a disease.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6349728
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| Actually, interesting to me is that there _are_ a lot of
| comments along the lines of "Well, I can't really figure out
| what they do from their website, but seems to be ..."
|
| Which I think is really telling. I guess in my old age I
| certainly have taken on the "If it sounds like bullshit, it
| almost certainly is." If you're really confident and proud of
| what you're doing, you explain it in the simplest terms
| possible.
| cryptica wrote:
| On one hand, the victims of her scams wanted her guilty, on the
| other, I suspect that those who are trying to dismantle the
| judicial branch of government wanted her to be not guilty. Good
| to see the legal system is holding up.
| relaunched wrote:
| Holmes is a member of the uber-elite, upper .01%. Prof Gardner,
| in this article - https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/06/03/she-saw-
| through-eliza... refers to Theranos as raising friends and family
| style funding. I guess her friends and family, given the circles
| she travels in, have a lot more money than most of ours.
|
| I've written about this a bit, but Elizabeth Holmes comes from 2
| dynastic families. On one side, the Holmes family, whose name is
| directly tied to medicine / hospitals / clinics across Ohio. On
| the same side, a little bit farther up, is the Fleischmann
| family. Those yeast packets and jars that are in your
| cupboard...yes, that Fleischmann.
| sharkweek wrote:
| This will sound weird but I am a collector of swag from large
| companies that have collapsed due to anything from mismanagement
| to outright fraud. While we're a rare breed there are others like
| me out there. Still, even with this oddly specific marketplace
| being small, let me tell you, the Theranos swag market is hot
| right now (check eBay if you're curious).
|
| Wish I had gone big on this one earlier, because I have a feeling
| this verdict is going to spice things up in the short term.
|
| All that to be said, if you've got any authentic Theranos gear
| hiding in storage please do let me know, I'm a motivated buyer.
|
| For those curious as one example: Nothing raises a few eyebrows
| more than a note written on Lehman Brothers letterhead with a
| Purdue Pharma OxyContin pen with the dosage pullout.
| mehrshad wrote:
| A colleague of mine was contracted by one of several firms
| tasked with liquidating Theranos' Newark facilities back in Aug
| 2018. I took the opportunity to grab the equivalent of $15,000
| of tools, furniture, scientific equipment, and of course, swag.
| All legally - liquidators are tasked with clearing the site of
| everything by a set time.
|
| Had free reign throughout the facility for two days, scavenging
| through 200k sqft+ of warehouse, marveling at the cringey
| pseudo-motivational blather posted everywhere and grabbing
| whatever could fit into my apartment at the time. At one point,
| we spotted Holmes (and her "special needs" Siberian Husky puppy
| who left dribbles of urine on the warehouse floor) arguing with
| some operators from afar.
|
| We weren't allowed to touch specific computers, chemicals or
| any hardware locked in the cages (incl Edison devices), but
| everything else was up for grabs, from high-end Mitutoyo
| measuring tools to Aeron chairs to U-Line desks, Theranos
| bumper stickers, water bottles, etc etc etc.
|
| So yeah, I've got a few bits of Theranos branded gear... Still
| waiting on the right time to sell.
|
| [0] https://imgur.com/a/36HtZCp
| jaynetics wrote:
| "Risk more than others think is wise", well, you have to
| admit they followed through on _that_ wall tattoo.
| ethbr0 wrote:
| If you're in the mood to sell, I'd be interested. 0 -> o +
| .co @ gmail.
|
| I like hubris branding for the same (mythical) reason
| Canadian engineers do iron rings [0]: so that maybe when I'm
| waivering on an important decision, I'll look down at the
| logo on my coffee cup and remember that some things are more
| important than immediate professional gratification.
|
| [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Ring
| nojs wrote:
| Classic pics, thanks for sharing. I'd love to see the full
| quote in the first photo. It almost reminds me of Office
| Space.
| _air wrote:
| I think the quote reads: "Far and away the best prize that
| life offers is the chance to work hard at work worth
| doing."
| FooHentai wrote:
| Huh. I never realized until this moment just how much I want
| to wear a work shirt that identifies me as 'Misty' from
| Theranos.
| samstave wrote:
| Thats: "Misty, Mr. Manager" to you
| hnacct2001 wrote:
| thanks for sharing -- most entertaining thread i've read in
| quite some time
| incanus77 wrote:
| About 15 years ago, I worked at a small tech/political agency
| in DC. We got a new office just off NW 16th & K near the
| lobbying & financial areas. While I was setting up the server
| closet, I found a rolled-up blueprint from the office design.
| We unrolled it and... turns out it was built by Enron. Ken Lay
| had just died, so we always kinda-sorta felt haunted by his
| ghost.
| spyspy wrote:
| I have some yik yak socks I got a few months before they went
| bankrupt. Didn't know there's a market for that.
| dannyphantom wrote:
| Oh wow, I remember using that app in high-school. That's
| awesome.
| grouphugs wrote:
| seumars wrote:
| >I am a collector of swag from large companies that have
| collapsed due to anything from mismanagement to outright fraud
| This is why I log on to this site.
| EZ-Cheeze wrote:
| That's hilarious and cool. You got a list of desirable brands?
| Off the top of my head I can only think of Enron, Lehman
| Brothers and Theranos.
| 12ian34 wrote:
| stock up now on swag from Exxon, BP, Shell, etc., and leave
| it a few decades!
| wepple wrote:
| Juicero!
| glenstein wrote:
| >the Theranos swag market is hot right now (check eBay if
| you're curious).
|
| I was curious. My ebay search for "theranos" turned up 50
| items. There were fleece jackets with high asking prices, so
| that certainly was something. But everything else I saw for
| mugs and hats and t-shirts was in the $20-50 range.
|
| https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=theranos
| dmix wrote:
| > But everything else I saw for mugs and hats and t-shirts
| was in the $20-50 range.
|
| Seems like plenty of new things not collectors items.
| sharkweek wrote:
| Most of those were likely never truly distributed
| specifically to employees in the first place. Reprint or
| print on demand swag is generally obvious with the white
| background. Look for real photos, especially in people's
| homes.
|
| In my totally arbitrary set of rules the item must have been
| available or given to employees only.
|
| Here's one I'd love to get my hands on if not for the price:
| https://www.ebay.com/itm/255014966170?hash=item3b6013939a:g:.
| ..
| 2YwaZHXV wrote:
| As someone who used to work there and has one of those
| water bottles and likely knows the person selling that one
| on ebay (based on the username) I find this hilarious...
| sharkweek wrote:
| So... how much you want for it?
| 2YwaZHXV wrote:
| Until seeing your comment I had never considered that
| someone might actually want any of that stuff, so I had
| never considered selling or otherwise parting with it
| since it is fun to keep all that stuff around. I'll
| certainly let you know first if I decide to part with it,
| though.
| Bud wrote:
| I do have two refrigerator magnets from Webvan, which died in
| 2001. Was a pretty cool service while it lasted.
| anduru_h wrote:
| I never knew this was a thing, but now that I do...I want in!
| civilized wrote:
| I totally get this! I would LOVE to have some Theranos crap.
| Then I would fabricate stories about why I have it, just like a
| real Theranos CEO!
|
| (Hmm... might as well fabricate the collectibles themselves, as
| some other commenters have suggested...)
| jedberg wrote:
| I have a hat that says "The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien"
| from the very first taping (and only seven months before the
| last taping!).
| jkeat wrote:
| Whoa nice, how'd you get that?
| jedberg wrote:
| I was at the taping! I won the lottery for tickets and got
| super lucky.
| thechao wrote:
| My favorite tshirt is for a company picnic for Enron (scheduled
| for after it's dissolution); the back is covered in MBAspeak:
| honesty, integrity, ... It's one of my favorites -- up there
| with my Orwellian yellow plastic "Great Place To Work" Intel
| _tamborine_.
| jaynetics wrote:
| > my Orwellian yellow plastic "Great Place To Work" Intel
| tamborine
|
| That sounds hilarious, can you post a picture?
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| nimazeighami wrote:
| It's not totally defunct yet but I saved a bunch of super rare
| Magic Leap swag exactly for people like you lol
| donkarma wrote:
| Now I want some, look at what you've started.
| chunkyks wrote:
| I worked at Lehman for a year around 1999/2000. While I was
| there, they handed out these plinths, I still have mine:
| https://imgur.com/a/NKnJh
| gbronner wrote:
| I worked with a guy who collected stock certificates of dead
| startups that he'd worked at, and displayed then in frames on
| his wall. I think he called them good misspent youth.
|
| The Lehman Brothers risk management/principles cube was a hot
| seller for a while, but I'm curious as to long term valuations.
| Thought the art collection didn't actually do that well on
| resale.
| dangle1 wrote:
| Someone in my neighborhood wore a Theranos sweatshirt while
| jogging last year, I made up a story in my head that it was in
| solidarity with Ms. Holmes. If I'm right, I assume she wouldn't
| be willing to part with it.
| y2kenny wrote:
| This reminds me of the Black Mirror's "Black Museum" episode...
| nyjah wrote:
| That's funny. I was just talking a friend of mine the other day
| that is printing a bunch of swag gear for Nikola Motors. I
| would guess he doesn't know the history of Nikola Motors and I
| didn't say anything, but I was thinking, how much swag does a
| potential scam company need?
| sokoloff wrote:
| Perhaps trucks roll downhill better if the occupant is
| wearing branded swag?
| daenz wrote:
| What a super interesting niche. Do you see returns on your
| investments?
| lbotos wrote:
| They said collector, so I suspect they aren't holding to sell
| :P
| testplzignore wrote:
| A Theranos memorabilia pump and dump scheme would be quite
| something.
| sharkweek wrote:
| To be completely honest, I'm more of a buyer than a seller. I
| have a few items that are "worth" (in a loose sense) in the
| hundreds and thousands, but most are nothing more than a rare
| conversation piece I have on my desk.
| OnlineGladiator wrote:
| > I have a few items that are worth in the hundreds and
| thousands
|
| At first I read 'worth in the hundreds _of_ thousands ' and
| I was really curious what garnered such value. Language
| ambiguity is fun.
| celticninja wrote:
| Do you have a website to show some of them off? I would
| love to see some of your gravestones.
| sharkweek wrote:
| This thread is the most interested anyone has ever been
| in this stuff, I'll have to consider some sort of catalog
| as the collection grows, not a bad idea.
| celticninja wrote:
| I'm assuming it's lots of dot-com era, do you also
| collect outside of tech? E.g Lehman Brothers or Enron
| sharkweek wrote:
| 08 graveyard is actually some of my favorite stuff. I
| love Lehman and Bear stuff.
| filmgirlcw wrote:
| Did you get the MSCHF fucked company toys? The tiny
| Theranos machine is adorable.
|
| Like you, I collect fucked/defunct company merch, tho my
| collection isn't just fraud related, I've got Quibi merch
| -- most of it is. I've got MoviePass, Fyre Festival legit
| merch with tags, Ozy Media was a recent one, Enron business
| cards, Arthur Andersen tote bags, Worldcom mugs, etc. I've
| even got some old Internet Explorer merch, because it's
| kitsch!
|
| What is your favorite piece?
| javajosh wrote:
| I don't remember where I first heard this, but it's good
| advice: don't collect as an investment, collect because you
| really enjoy the objects. I collect rare books, but never
| because I think they'll go up in value (although they
| probably will). I just like having them around. Socially,
| infamous corpo-swag is really even better - what a
| conversation starter! But I personally wouldn't want that
| sort of stuff in my shared spaces. Interesting or not, its
| still just corpo-swag.
| volkl48 wrote:
| While I totally agree about not collecting as an
| investment, "because you really enjoy the objects as a
| person who likes this stuff" is probably not actually a
| terrible metric for future desirability of an item in a
| niche area of collecting. Other fans/collectors likely feel
| the same. Of course, it doesn't tell you if that niche will
| die out and no one will want anything, although I suspect
| rare books are less at risk of that.
|
| As a collector of memorabilia for a band that's been around
| a while: The items I was drawn to, either because I just
| loved the look or because they were from a show/tour/album
| I particularly found special, have often turned out to be
| the ones that have appreciated much more in value than the
| average thing of that level of rarity for the band.
| dmazin wrote:
| Cool! Do you focus on any subjects?
|
| Also, have you seen The Booksellers?
|
| It took me a while to realize I was collecting books.
| Before, the way I thought of it was "I would never walk
| past an out-of-print book about computing history! I might
| never come across it again!" But now I am a bit more
| focused on the collection aspect, for example, there are
| now specific titles and authors that I seek out.
| javajosh wrote:
| I have a good collection of old science books. One of my
| favorites is called "The Perfect Woman", publish in 1896,
| and it is a manual for women. It's precisely as
| horrifying and unintentionally hilarious as you would
| expect. But mostly I collect early editions of my
| favorite stories, or occasionally limited editions like
| from Subterranean Press. And no, I have not seen The
| Booksellers. I got into this because as a kid I'd buy a
| lot of books from our neighborhood used book dealer,
| mostly cheap science fiction paperbacks. I've tried
| ebooks a couple of times, and I just don't like them. I
| wish I did because it's highly convenient. But I just
| really prefer paper. For one thing you can give away your
| book when you're finished with it, or loan it to a
| friend, neither of which you can do with an ebook.
| dehrmann wrote:
| > don't collect as an investment
|
| I've seen a lot of Pawn Stars in the past six months. They
| never say this, but you can put it together. Most things
| that people collect trade in low volumes, so pricing is
| hard, and the bid/ask spread kills you. If you decide to
| sell, you'll either get 70% of the value if you sell it
| fast, or maybe 100% if you're ready to wait two years. If
| you want to liquidate everything, it might depress the
| market. There's also a discount when you have it as a
| collection because someone could part it out, but that's
| even more time. That, and the drive to collect is building
| the collection, so there's less utility in getting an
| instant collection.
| brandall10 wrote:
| I could imagine having a little 'altar' of failed company
| swag on a shelf in your office could be fun and motivating
| in a way.
| minism wrote:
| Happen to own a juicero? Its a dream to have that on a shelf
| one day.
| cammikebrown wrote:
| Got any Clinkle swag?
| jjordan wrote:
| Great timing! Not sure if this qualifies, but I just listed a
| copy of the Oct 2015 Inc Magazine where she was touted as "The
| Next Steve Jobs". Was a subscriber back in the day.
| https://ebay.com/itm/255312572520
| meetingthrower wrote:
| One of my biggest regrets is not getting a Kozmo messenger bag
| from dotcom 1.
| pcl wrote:
| Ooh I used to have an amazing Kozmo keychain. When I lost
| those keys I was more upset about losing the chain than my
| house keys!
| wrs wrote:
| One of my prized possessions is a Kozmo-branded CD opener,
| which I got by ordering a single CD from Kozmo, with free
| one-hour delivery. Thanks, venture capital!
| sharkweek wrote:
| Yes! Double points for a dead company logo on a tool now so
| nearly useless
| sho_hn wrote:
| What intrigued me about your comment is the reference to a
| "CD opener". I had no idea!
| mkl wrote:
| CD case opener, I believe:
| https://www.promotionalgiftwholesale.com/custom-cd-jewel-
| cas...
| jgwil2 wrote:
| Is this for getting the shrink wrap off of a new CD case?
| Because I can't imagine needing a tool otherwise.
| mkl wrote:
| Yes, there's a recessed blade. I don't remember needing a
| tool for the wrap though either, and I never saw one of
| these in reality. They seem to have been common swag
| though: MySpace https://old.reddit.com/r/nostalgia/commen
| ts/95tooc/myspace_e..., Napster
| https://autonomic.guru/found-items-cd-case-opener/.
| nerdponx wrote:
| I remember actually using these and them not working very
| well, or not well enough to actually remember you had one
| and go get it from the drawer.
|
| But it sure does make me nostalgic!
| walrus01 wrote:
| I know someone who has both beenz and flooz promotional stuff
| proactivesvcs wrote:
| _blinks_ Do you mean to say that Beenz wasn 't a fever
| dream I enjoyed? Next you'll be telling me that Swatch's
| Beats was a real, actual attempt at redefining time, and
| wasn't just something I overheard being invented by a bunch
| of Jolly People at the pub one night.
| nikanj wrote:
| The crazy thing is, Beats is a reasonable idea. The whole
| hype surrounding it was stupid, but a fully-remote-
| across-seventeen-timezones team would really benefit from
| a single, well-defined time standard. No more "Can I call
| you at 8am your time?" "Sorry do you mean my time at
| home, or my time in Costa Rica (came here for the
| holidays)"
| walrus01 wrote:
| This is why UTC already exists and is used for aviation,
| military, telecom and ISP purposes.
| subpixel wrote:
| I laughed at the CueCat, but now I wish I had one of my own.
| Tempest1981 wrote:
| Under $20 on ebay:
|
| https://www.ebay.com/b/CueCat-POS-Barcode-
| Scanners/46706/bn_...
|
| Even some cases of 100 for $500.
| Legogris wrote:
| I can totally get behind this. Holding tight on my Blockchains
| LLC swag half-hoping there will have a wider audience of
| recognition than the other people at that Prague conference.
| The other half hoping they actually manage to create something
| of lasting value, of course ;)
| filmgirlcw wrote:
| I am also a fucked company swag collector and Theranos has been
| my white whale since 2015/early 2016. Now it's all knockoffs. I
| wish you luck in your search!
| [deleted]
| sharkweek wrote:
| Well well... I imagine we've crossed paths on eBay before -
| too funny.
| filmgirlcw wrote:
| Amazing to meet another fucked company collector! I thought
| this was something only I did, genuinely.
| jpm_sd wrote:
| This feels like a real Colin Robinson / Evie Russell
| meet-cute*
|
| [*from What We Do In The Shadows]
| TaylorAlexander wrote:
| Reminds me of the water bottle from Palantir I have that seems
| very cursed.
| annoyingnoob wrote:
| Collector or Speculator?
| anigbrowl wrote:
| I wish I'd known that notorious S.W.A.G. was A Thing because I
| pegged her as a scam artist when she first entered the public
| sphere. Next time my spidey-senses tip me off I'm gonna acquire
| as much promotional material as possible.
| sushisource wrote:
| This is a really cool hobby I never would've guessed existed.
| Good luck to you!
| CPLX wrote:
| I've got a nice looking Ozy coffee mug if you're interested.
| marnett wrote:
| What an awesome collection/hobby Thanks for sharing. Is there
| any way to see all that you have?. I became interested in this
| after seeing someone with an Enron shirt on at a music festival
| earlier this year. Surely it was not an "original", as you
| collect, but it had me reflecting on the artistic value.
| arcticbull wrote:
| If anyones got a juicero lmk I'll pay double market haha
| whatever1 wrote:
| Do you have the epic ENRON intern Tshirt in your collection ?
| systemvoltage wrote:
| My intern job back in 2005 was to take Enron's wind turbine
| division's technical handbooks and scan them on large flat
| bed scanners. They were all stored in Tehachapi desert,
| flooded and with water damage. I found a bunch of cool stuff
| in these boxes including a binder containing Enron's branding
| assets and standards manual.
| AdamN wrote:
| Why not a stock certificate :-)
|
| https://www.apmex.com/product/50847/enron-corp-stock-
| certifi...
| dmix wrote:
| Only 3 left in stock!
|
| Also I love that website. As a recent casual collector of
| paper currency. I never thought to buy some old
| stocks/bonds.
|
| Edit: it'd be hilarious I'd the Enron stock was fake
| dooglius wrote:
| What does "authentic" mean here? Isn't company swag just the
| company emailing a logo to 3rd parties who print it on
| shirts/whatever?
| rot13xor wrote:
| I assume you could buy the stuff from the company's
| bankruptcy auction or when it gets auctioned off by the Feds
| like in the case of Martin Shkreli's exclusive Wu Tang album.
| rbobby wrote:
| Shhhhhh! You'll disturb the market!
| VWWHFSfQ wrote:
| This is some of the scammiest markets of all time.
|
| Hey OP, I got a Theranos-branded mug I can drop-ship you from
| Alibaba. $800 OBO
| miohtama wrote:
| What you do not have is called provenance :)
| [deleted]
| brandall10 wrote:
| Just out of curiosity, how does one prove provenance?
|
| I'd think the only way is to be the original owner (ie
| proof of employment at the company), but even then, given
| such a hot marketplace it would be super easy to just
| purchase and resell knockoffs.
| hyperbovine wrote:
| > Just out of curiosity, how does one prove provenance?
|
| The same way they do it with art ... research.
| brandall10 wrote:
| But with art there is only one work produced by an
| artist, or if a series, probably some way to properly id
| it based on a number of factors.
|
| With say a sweatshirt produced by a third party based on
| some digital stencil art, do you know for sure the one
| you're receiving was printed by the company and given to
| an employee/customer? Literally hundreds, possibly
| thousands would be in circulation. How would you be able
| to distinguish that from say something a former employee
| w/ access to the original art data having it reprinted?
| sharkweek wrote:
| I try my best to only procure swag that was actually
| distributed by the company at time of operation. As an
| example, you can buy "joke" Enron t-shirts, which I wouldn't
| be interested in, but some authentic team building event-
| specific shirt distributed to 50ish people? Oh baby, I'm all
| ears.
|
| I think that's part of the fun, hunting for the original
| stuff.
| rozap wrote:
| Other people have commented, but I'd also enjoy a post or
| album of your most prized dead company swag artifacts.
|
| I worked for a "hot" a16z startup just out of college, with
| a trendy office and the :rocket: :moon: vibe. They went
| under a few years after I bailed, but I still wear the
| t-shirt because it makes me chuckle.
|
| In a strange twist of fate, I decided to exercise my few
| options, and I had to mail my stock exercise notice to some
| place with a check for ~$2500 to purchase them. USPS lost
| the letter and saved me $2500.
| alphabetting wrote:
| Would seriously love to hear about your most prized items
| in this shitco collection
| ghostbrainalpha wrote:
| Can you guys share your collection? I'm not a part of this
| hobby yet, but I'm immediately on board.
|
| Would you be interested in an unreleased "Cosby Show" lego
| set that was supposed to come out right before he got
| cancelled?
| k12sosse wrote:
| Is that where we are today? Admitting[0] to drugging
| women, and then sexually assaulting them under the
| influence qualifies as 'cancelling'? Weird.
|
| 0: https://www.cnn.com/2015/07/07/us/bill-cosby-
| quaaludes-sexua...
| dang wrote:
| I'm sure it was unintentional, but your comment here is
| where the thread went haywire. Maybe it would be helpful
| to explain why.
|
| The discussion about disgraced-public-figure memorabilia
| was certainly offtopic, but it was offtopic in a
| whimsical and unpredictable way. That's ok on HN because
| it's interesting. What's not interesting, and is the bad
| kind of offtopicness, is turning the thread into a
| generic argument about some inflammatory thing that has
| already had countless flamewars. If you review
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html, you'll
| see that we have several rules that are intended to act
| as flame retardant against this kind of thing:
|
| " _Eschew flamebait. Avoid unrelated controversies and
| generic tangents._ "
|
| " _Please respond to the strongest plausible
| interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one
| that 's easier to criticize. Assume good faith._"
|
| " _Please don 't pick the most provocative thing in an
| article or post to complain about in the thread. Find
| something interesting to respond to instead._"
|
| The high-indignation, high-repetition flamewar topics are
| like black holes that suck in threads that swerve too
| close to them. Since they're so repetitive (and generally
| so nasty), they're definitely not what HN is for, so we
| should all try to steer clear of them.
|
| https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&
| que...
| rfw300 wrote:
| Not to put words in OP's mouth, but I think they were
| using "cancel" descriptively, not pejoratively. I don't
| think there was a suggestion he didn't deserve to be
| cancelled, just that he was.
| [deleted]
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Not to put words in OP's mouth, but I think they were
| using "cancel" descriptively, not pejoratively.
|
| If that was the intent, it was a pretty big mistake to
| use "before he got cancelled" instead of "before the show
| got cancelled". The former construct in modern usage is
| pretty exclusively used for pejorative references to
| actions attributed to "cancel culture".
| ghostbrainalpha wrote:
| It's my fault for not being more clear with my language.
|
| But I actually meant "literally" cancelled. The Lego set
| was planned to come out with an actual REBOOT of the
| Cosby Show, which was cancelled in the traditional
| meaning of the word, like the TV did not go to air.
|
| https://tvseriesfinale.com/tv-show/nbc-kills-new-bill-
| cosby-....
| filoleg wrote:
| "Canceling" means removal of support and denouncement of
| a public figure, justified or not. In Bill Cosby's case,
| it was absolutely justified, as he himself admitted to
| his wrongdoings. What issue do you have with that term
| being used to describe what happened?
| tomjakubowski wrote:
| I can only speak for myself but I can't say I've ever
| seen anyone talk about someone having been "canceled"
| unless they objected to the person losing their stature
| or were making a joke.
| inopinatus wrote:
| Well, now you have.
| dijit wrote:
| Cancelling is what happens to TV shows when they stop
| airing or being produced.
|
| That was the meaning before "cancel culture" and was the
| intent of the parent.
|
| I didn't at all read it the way you did, maybe I'm older
| than you and I've seen more shows cancelled. (Firefly,
| for a famous enough example)
| filoleg wrote:
| Have you missed the entire #MeToo movement? Because
| people were cheering themselves on for (justifiably)
| canceling Harvey Weinstein using that exact same word to
| refer to the actions taken against him.
| yeetaccount4 wrote:
| dang wrote:
| No doubt users flagged it because of the name-calling and
| snark. You shouldn't be posting like that here.
| jasonfarnon wrote:
| He admits nothing of the sort in your link. Maybe read
| the link you offered others.
| kingcharles wrote:
| > Would you be interested in an unreleased "Cosby Show"
| lego set that was supposed to come out right before he
| got cancelled?
|
| Can't tell if serious. If serious, was this out of Lego
| Ideas (Cuusoo)? [I worked on the Back to the Future
| DeLorean set with the designers in Denmark]
| F_J_H wrote:
| Former Enron employee here - I have some swag I was given
| when I first started (lunch kit, values booklet, etc. Also
| have some golf shirts and baseball caps.
|
| Worth anything?
| dylan604 wrote:
| >values booklet
|
| Very very very curious of the text contained within.
| celticninja wrote:
| This page intentionally left blank.
| threwawasy1228 wrote:
| Absolutely, you could get some great value for that on
| ebay, or grailed.com
| Maursault wrote:
| > As an example, you can buy "joke" Enron t-shirts, which I
| wouldn't be interested in
|
| I would not be interested in authentic Theranos swag, but I
| would pay a lot for a new knockoff mock turtleneck with the
| old MPlayer logo on it. Now I can't even find the old
| MPlayer logo anymore.
| ImaCake wrote:
| You could try the old revisions on wikipedia https://en.w
| ikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=MPlayer&oldid=790...
| rwmj wrote:
| I still have the Enron mug which I nicked from their London
| office.
| abakker wrote:
| I've got two beer glasses from WeWork that say "glass half
| full" on them. They make me laugh every single time I see them.
| iab wrote:
| half Kombucha, half lies
| arcticbull wrote:
| Now that's a powerful slogan
| yobert wrote:
| I have a WeWork shirt that says "The Future Is Awesome". I
| used to hate it but now I love it :D
| redisman wrote:
| The metal ones? They still have those at the offices
| rrrrrrrrrrrryan wrote:
| For anyone who wants to read more about this hobby:
| https://outline.com/TCdngY
| Tepix wrote:
| We still have a nice Webvan magnet on our fridge somewhere.
| Good times.
| short12 wrote:
| I have a lehnen brothers decision cube type of thing and it has
| some pretty interesting ones like "responsible risk management"
| erc
| gbronner wrote:
| Practice sound risk management! I still have a coffee cup and
| a a garment bag that I bought for 10$
| SkyMarshal wrote:
| Maybe contact @pud and turn his old https://fuckedcompany.com/
| website into an online museum for that swag.
| BeefWellington wrote:
| Along these lines an old investor I knew kept a framed Bre-X
| share on his wall.
| jafo wrote:
| Holy cow...Bre-X that takes me back. People were actually
| suicided in that one.
| walrus01 wrote:
| The whole bre-x saga really amazes some Americans when I
| explain the depths of fraud that have historically existed in
| AB and BC small cap mining stocks...
|
| For the longest time the historical Vancouver stock exchange,
| vsx, was known as something like the fraud capital of North
| America.
|
| All of that is before we even get into the ugly history of
| some Canadian mining companies that have got into bed with
| non-democratic regimes in places in the developing world,
| where they did actually have a real mineral resource to
| extract, and damn the consequences.
| jazzyjackson wrote:
| Never heard of this, reading the wiki on bre-x now...
|
| " ...one of the five women who considered themselves his
| wife... "
|
| This is some serious drama. Have you got any reading you
| can recommend on the topic? I recently bought "The Prize"
| to catch up on my oil & gas history, perhaps there is a
| sibling book for minerals?
| walrus01 wrote:
| as I recall several Canadian journalists wrote books on
| it. It was also extensively covered in the western
| provinces' newspapers and national papers (the globe and
| mail, etc) at the time.
| paxys wrote:
| How exactly do you check if something is authentic? I can have
| a hundred Theranos-branded t-shirts, mugs, pens, diaries, socks
| and whatever else you want made and shipped to me in like 2
| weeks.
| Danieru wrote:
| That's your job. Sellers are motivated to provide evidence.
| "I just have it lol" is not going to command much premium
| over your costs.
| throwawaylinux wrote:
| Yes that's hilarious but you're missing the interesting
| part. How does the seller provide convincing evidence that
| withstands scrutiny such that a diligent buyer would be
| satisfied that it is authentic then.
| Ansil849 wrote:
| > I am a collector of swag from large companies that have
| collapsed due to anything from mismanagement to outright fraud
|
| That's a really cool collection! I always find it interesting
| to learn what obscure things folks collect.
|
| > any authentic Theranos gear
|
| How do you tell if it's authentic? If I was a collector in this
| area, my big concern would be that especially given that the
| market is hot, someone could just look on ebay for images of
| branded products, and then make replicas of them by passing the
| same logo onto promotional printers.
| 0xdeadbeefbabe wrote:
| Authenticity aside, I'd still buy that voice lowering
| vocoder.
| dylan604 wrote:
| >I always find it interesting to learn what obscure things
| folks collect.
|
| A buddy of mine has a similar fascination with picking things
| up from defunct companies, specializing in film/video post
| production companies. One of the items he picked up was a
| standard banker's box. Inside were a pile of CD-Rs which
| turned out to be the entire digital back up of an unfinished
| 3D animated feature. The entire recordings of the actor's
| lines. The 3D objects, scenes, etc to an unknown level of
| completeness. Even though the work product was purchased from
| the bankruptcy auction, the copyright was still owned by the
| creators and could not be rendered/released just because they
| bought a box in auction for $20.
| barneygale wrote:
| > Even though the work product was purchased from the
| bankruptcy auction, the copyright was still owned by the
| creators and could not be rendered/released just because
| they bought a box in auction for $20.
|
| Does the first-sale doctrine not apply here?
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine
| Ansil849 wrote:
| Wow, that's so fun to stumble upon a veritable treasure
| chest like that. Were there any big names involved in the
| unfinished film?
| dylan604 wrote:
| There were actors you'd recognize the names of, but not
| sure they would qualify as A-list (at least at the time
| it was recorded). I'm just not able to recall who they
| were. That was 15-ish years ago, and it was only a story
| told over a lunch. Not something that made it to long
| term memory.
| bombcar wrote:
| Promo freebies change so often that you can often work out
| what company and what year made a particular squeeze toy or
| similar.
|
| And rip offs will often have subpar artwork obviously not
| using original AI/EPS files.
| dannyw wrote:
| You underestimate the lengths people go to make knockoffs.
| thoms_a wrote:
| Hmmm, I wonder if any Goldman Sachs execs did time for all of the
| proven fraud they committed, which led to a stock market crash?
|
| Nope. They just got bailed out by the Fed, and given bonuses.
| This is how you know which profession runs the American empire.
| It sure as hell isn't tech CEOs.
| rajacombinator wrote:
| All the VCs should be held complicit as well.
| dehrmann wrote:
| For letting themselves be defrauded?
| space_rock wrote:
| Yes. How dare you be a victim of a crime
| space_rock wrote:
| Why? Is there evidence that were in on the criminal conspiracy?
| All I've heard it they were victims of it
| MarkMc wrote:
| Someone mentioned that Holmes will likely get a relatively light
| sentence because she is an attractive white woman.
|
| I've read there is good evidence that black people get harsher
| sentences than white people and men get harsher sentences than
| women, other factors being equal. I suspect there is also
| evidence attractive people get lighter sentences than ugly
| people.
|
| The current system seems like a clear-cut violation of the US
| constitution's Equal Protection clause. So why doesn't an
| organisation like the ACLU take legal action to force all
| sentencing to be done by a judge who is unaware of the race, sex
| and attractiveness of the defendant?
| cmckn wrote:
| Probably wise to avoid postulating until she is actually
| sentenced.
| pvg wrote:
| Because there's a sixth as well as a fourteenth amendment
| jasonfarnon wrote:
| what's the relevance of those amendments? are you misreading
| the right to confrontation?
| manquer wrote:
| First Equal Protection clause from the 14th Amendment applies
| to only states and not federally. [1]
|
| Second, It is extremely hard to prove that discrimination
| happens while _all other things are equal_ . Rarely all other
| things are also equal as there are many strongly correlated
| factors with race[2] that can adversely impact conviction, for
| example being black on average would be poorer and would more
| have a court appointed attorney who is looking to close a
| case(given his load) rather than win for each defendant and
| push a defendant to plea out than go to trial etc. Is this
| directly because he is black ?
|
| Race, age and gender are objectively measurable [3],
| "attractiveness" is _lot_ more subjective to eyes of the
| beholder. How do you even come up with a scale for legal
| purpose of measuring bias like this ?
|
| U.S. follows trial by jury, by definition that means the jury
| of peers are to take the law and your entire specific example
| and act with full freedom as they see fit ( even nullify laws
| if they wish to do so). In a such a system there will be
| biases, because people are inherently biased. While there are
| some efforts to reduce this, like no all white juries against
| black defendants etc, unless there is fundamentally different
| system biases can not be eliminated.
|
| The biggest determining factor is Money. Richer you are, less
| likely to have trouble with law, and get away with a lot.
| White, young, female and attractive correlates to being rich.
| Sadly that is how the world works.
|
| [1] There are similar protections in the 5th Amendment Due
| Process Clauses that can be applied at a federal level.
|
| [2] Similar examples to other factors as well
|
| [3] Race and Gender can have some ambiguity but in most cases
| it is clear
| jasonfarnon wrote:
| 1. This is a federal not state case. 2. Yes it is hard to
| prove discrimination controlling for all other things. Yet
| courts routinely do this. There is a process in place.
| Moreover, findings of discrimination have led to other
| structural changes in the judicial system, e.g.,
| administration of the death penalty. 3. OP was talking about
| blinding the judge, not the jury. Sentencing, not verdict.
|
| I agree that attractiveness is ridiculously subjective.
|
| What I like about OP's argument is, I can think of few legit
| reasons for a sentencing judge (as opposed to fact-finding
| jury) to need to see a defendant rather than just hearing the
| arguments being made, and I can think of many drawbacks to
| allowing a judge to do so, such as conscious or unconscious
| biases.
| manquer wrote:
| I am aware it is federal, which is why i was pointing out
| that equal protection clause does not apply directly.
| MarkMc wrote:
| > First Equal Protection clause from the 14th Amendment
| applies to only states and not federally
|
| The Holmes case was merely the catalyst for my thinking. The
| point remains: Why isn't there a legal push to have blind
| sentencing, at least for state crimes?
|
| > Second, It is extremely hard to prove that discrimination
| happens while all other things are equal.
|
| It's not that hard. You take a sentencing case - say, guilty
| plea to armed robbery with no prior convictions - and pair it
| with a similar case where the defendant is a different race
| (ideally without know the actual races involved). You do that
| for 1000 cases and then show that the sentencing is generally
| harsher for one race than the other.
|
| > U.S. follows trial by jury...In a such a system there will
| be biases, because people are inherently biased
|
| I'm talking about making sentencing less biased. I don't have
| any suggestions for making the trial less biased.
|
| > The biggest determining factor is Money. Richer you are,
| less likely to have trouble with law, and get away with a
| lot.
|
| OK but when it comes to sentencing money should not be a
| factor - rich and poor should receive a similar sentence for
| a similar crime.
|
| > Race, age and gender are objectively measurable [3],
| "attractiveness" is lot more subjective to eyes of the
| beholder.
|
| Sure, but it's not completely random. If you and I both
| choose the most attractive person in a group of 10 people,
| the chance that we both choose the same person is far greater
| than 10%.
|
| Let's say we ask 100 people to rate defendants by
| attractiveness and use the average score for each defendant.
| It's quite possible we would find the gap in sentencing
| severity between the top-10% and bottom-10% people in terms
| of attractiveness is greater than the gap between black and
| white defendants.
|
| But it's really a moot point - if we prevent the sentencing
| judge from knowing the race and sex of the defendant then the
| judge will also not know how attractive he or she is.
| petilon wrote:
| Some founders "fake it till you make it", and this news should
| serve as a cautionary tale.
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| "Fake it till you make it" originally meant behaving as an
| established company would, as opposed to presenting yourself as
| an upstart startup without a lot of customers. Basically:
| Professional website, formal company structure, normal business
| sales practices, having people available to answer the phones,
| and so on. You still had to do the work and deliver the
| results, but the goal was to overcome hesitancy to use startups
| instead of established companies.
|
| It didn't mean literally lying about your capabilities or
| accomplishments in order to garner more investment money.
|
| That's not "fake it till you make it". That's just fraud. It's
| not really hard to distinguish between the two, despite the way
| some people are trying to merge the two definitions.
| stareblinkstare wrote:
| jiggawatts wrote:
| It's fairly common to see an element of outright fakery
| before the _hopeful_ -but-not-guaranteed "till you make it".
|
| A coworker was using a mobile app from a startup offering to
| do "receipt OCR using AI/ML" when in fact they were sending
| most of the scanned pictures to a call-center in India to be
| manually entered. They hadn't yet figured out the fancy image
| recognition algorithm, so they were just throwing AWS
| Mechanical Turk at it while building up a user base.
| Realistically, they might _never_ get to that level of AI
| while staying solvent.
|
| That's not so different ethically to what Theranos was doing.
| The only difference with Theranos is the scale of it all.
| rocqua wrote:
| There are two parts to this comparison. The first is, do
| they outright lie. If they are claiming "we are using AI"
| to investors, that might be fraud. But that is avoidable
| with just adding in "we are using AI for some receipts".
|
| The second, and more important, question is, are they
| harming customers. Theranus gave people unreliable blood
| test results and lied about their reliability. That does
| actual harm to customers. Whereas for scanning receipts the
| only thing a customer really cares about is accuracy.
| josho wrote:
| > That's not so different ethically to what Theranos was
| doing
|
| No. One is we know we can do OCR, we know we can do AI,
| it's just an engineering effort to put those pieces
| together. The risk is schedule risk.
|
| Theranos was hard science. They did not know if they could
| do what they fraudulently claimed they had already done.
| They needed scientific discoveries to deliver. The risk was
| can the necessary technology be invented.
| jgwil2 wrote:
| This is by the way but I love the phrase "upstart startup."
| globular-toast wrote:
| I thought "fake it till you make it" was more of an
| individual strategy, not a company strategy. If a company
| behaves like an established company would, they are not
| faking anything, they are behaving like an established
| company would. For the individual strategy it's more about
| combating impostor syndrome. At higher levels many people
| have this feeling that others have something they don't, so
| it's telling people to just accept that feeling and _be_ the
| impostor, because, in fact, everyone is an impostor anyway.
| xpe wrote:
| FITYMI can also be interpreted as presenting yourself (and
| company) with confidence that sometimes only more successful
| people (and companies) radiate. Like the comment above says,
| this does _not_ mean lying.
| junon wrote:
| Fraud it till you got it?
| mertd wrote:
| Maybe don't fake "medical devices" till you make it.
| throwawaylinux wrote:
| She was not found guilty on any charges of harming or
| swindling patients.
|
| This was about the wealthy investors. They will come after
| you whether you fake medical devices or bombs.
| paxys wrote:
| The Justice Department was only interested in the case
| because Theranos operated in a highly regulated industry
| with lots of government oversight. SaaS and consumer tech
| startup founders lie and cheat and blow up investor money
| every day and no one really cares.
|
| All the wealthy investors gain nothing from Holmes going to
| jail. In fact the lengthy trial only drags them into the
| spotlight, which they'd rather stay clear of.
| throwawaylinux wrote:
| > The Justice Department was only interested in the case
| because Theranos operated in a highly regulated industry
| with lots of government oversight.
|
| I don't think so. I think there were very powerful
| investors and others associated with the company (like
| board members) who were stung and embarrassed.
|
| > SaaS and consumer tech startup founders lie and cheat
| and blow up investor money every day and no one really
| cares.
|
| Do you have any roughly equivalent examples on the scale
| of the fraud and the people associated?
|
| > All the wealthy investors gain nothing from Holmes
| going to jail. In fact the lengthy trial only drags them
| into the spotlight, which they'd rather stay clear of.
|
| I disagree with this too. It's a good way to clear their
| names as it were ("we aren't greedy gullible idiots, she
| tricked us"), and a great way to send a message not to
| cross the ruling class.
| s_dev wrote:
| They were the only people not guaranteed an outcome --
| investment is inherently risky. Medical procedures are not.
| joering2 wrote:
| the point is she could have never made it. First year grads
| of meds schools would look at it and tell you its impossible.
| Its like knowing a floppy stores 1.44 MB and showing it as a
| breaking technology - we won't change anything but we tell
| you it will fit 16TB with our magical formula.
| analog31 wrote:
| I could almost see "fake it til you make it" if your idea is
| based on already proven technology, but success depends on
| something like brand recognition, network effect, etc. In the
| case of Theranos, whether her technology worked or not was
| ultimately going to be decided by Mother Nature, not by a
| market.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| No, no, no. I see this all the time around Theranos ("Hey,
| there are lots of other fake-it-til-you-make-it companies out
| there, Theranos just went to extremes"), and I don't think it's
| accurate, at all.
|
| The line around fraud is really not that gray. If you're lying
| about _current facts_ for personal gain, that 's fraud. You can
| hype all you want about the future, and most VCs are actually
| fine with you selling them the "yeah, it's hamster wheels in
| the backend now, but just wait until we build out our tech and
| scale!" line (just see all the well funded "AI" startups that
| just have legions of people "training" the AI), but if you say
| that it's the whizbang tech _right now_ , but it's really just
| hamster wheels, that's fraud.
|
| Fraud is not just an extension of "aggressive selling".
| Waterluvian wrote:
| The sociopaths who are attracted to founder life are immune to
| this lesson.
| every wrote:
| She strikes me as the cute blonde version of Orson Welles in
| The Third Man...
| ShamelessC wrote:
| r00fus wrote:
| Faking it doesn't work if you are committing fraud?
| throwawaylinux wrote:
| Overtonwindow wrote:
| I think that's the key point here. Was Jucero fraud? I think
| there's a clear line between a) we have an idea for a product
| but we have certain limitations that are feasible to
| overcome, with more time and investment; versus b) we have a
| product, we're using it in the field, patients are using it,
| and it works great. In the first scenario, you could fake the
| dream but you're not promising something that you know to be
| absolutely false.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| Fake it all you want until your fakery harms innocent parties.
| petilon wrote:
| What's an example of a fakery that doesn't harm innocent
| parties? If you pretend a product (or a feature) that doesn't
| exist exists, then at the very least a competitor is unfairly
| harmed.
| manquer wrote:
| Innocent is perhaps the operative word. If investors expect
| and/or used to certain amount of fakery they are not
| "innocent" [1] or if the competitors are doing the same
| thing they are not necessarily "innocent" either.
|
| [1] In this context to take meaning as knowledge, not
| meaning "not guilty" here.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| If a site like Reddit gets started by creating nonexistent
| or sock-puppet users, for instance, that's hardly on the
| same level as falsifying medical tests "just until we get
| the bugs sorted out."
| richardwhiuk wrote:
| The conviction here was defrauding investors, not
| defrauding medical tests.
|
| If Reddit included those sock-puppet users in their
| metrics to investors, then that would be roughly
| equivalent fraud.
| streblo wrote:
| In the legal sense, competition doesn't qualify as an
| innocent party.
| Carlee wrote:
| Can someone share some light on what's covered in the wire
| transfers?
| sidcool wrote:
| Trevor Milton better be scared. His was a bigger fraud
| fnord77 wrote:
| why are the charges "wire fraud" and not just "defrauding
| investors" ?
|
| is there some technicality at play here?
| [deleted]
| bluishgreen wrote:
| Yes, In order to invoke federal jurisdiction the SEC uses the
| fact that they communicated beyond state lines over the wire.
| This is why all the charges are called wire fraud. Relevant:
| https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/commerce_clause
| fnord77 wrote:
| so if she only dealt with california investors, this trial
| wouldn't be happening?
| greenyoda wrote:
| Then she could be prosecuted by the State of California,
| for violation of state fraud laws.
| notch656a wrote:
| Basically everything is interstate commerce. See Wickard
| v Filburn. It's why growing your own pot or making your
| own machine gun earns you federal jail time, even if they
| never enter commerce or leave the state. Basically
| whether commerce leaves state lines means nothing in
| terms of whether there is interstate commerce; even
| growing your own crops to feed to your own animals is
| considered interstate commerce.
|
| Whether a wire left the state means dick to whether the
| federal government has constitutional authority over it,
| per supreme court.
| greenyoda wrote:
| > _See Wickard v Filburn_
|
| Interesting case, thanks. Here's a link if someone else
| is interested:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wickard_v._Filburn
| irthomasthomas wrote:
| On the subject of lying tech CEOs, will Musk ever pay for his
| sins?
|
| "I feel very confident predicting 1 million autonomous robo-taxis
| for Tesla next year" - E. Musk 2019
|
| Did he ever atone for this, or is he still kicking the can down
| the road?
|
| Edit: I know, I know... It's not a crime until it is. Let a jury
| decide if Musk lied, or if he genuinely believed that his company
| was capable of producing 1 million robotaxis in a year. I would
| love to know what his staff where telling him that would lead him
| to this "very confident" prediction.
| Abimelex wrote:
| "I feel very confident" - well you can't sue somebody for his
| feelings ...
| yoelo wrote:
| simonsarris wrote:
| Being wrong about a prediction, even being very wrong, is not
| the same as lying or defrauding.
|
| By 2019 pretty much everyone knows that Musk is a person who
| makes extremely ambitious predictions, projections, timelines,
| etc, and tries to meet them. Almost anyone in that situation
| will have a low hit rate. There's no sin to pay for, this is
| how he chooses to work and structure his businesses. Investors
| tend to be very happy with the results. To them, making a large
| number of ambitious goals and meeting _some_ of them is still
| very worthwhile.
|
| If you want to invest in companies where they make no such
| predictions, and the CEOs are never wrong, you are welcome to
| buy GE and follow their CEO on twitter. He has never, ever made
| a wrong prediction: https://twitter.com/larryculpjr
| loudtieblahblah wrote:
| But its aimed at Musk so no matter what it's an astute point!
| /s
| emptyfile wrote:
| What about making a prediction while being, as you're saying
| it, 95% sure its bullshit?
|
| Is that not lying? When does it become lying, when you're
| 100% sure you're not saying the truth?
| joshmlewis wrote:
| I think he makes these predictions based on the absolute
| best case scenario he can think of. It's hard to prove he
| had fraudulent intent unless you had communication from him
| that showed he knew what he was saying was impossible.
| JCharante wrote:
| It becomes lying when it can be proved to be false. Stating
| that your company currently provides 200 blood analysis
| when it does not is very easy to disprove given insider
| documentation. Saying that by next year you'll be able to
| support the 1000 most common blood analysis is not lying,
| it's a somewhat of a promise but of course projects go
| behind schedule all the time.
|
| There's a difference between saying I weigh less than 90kg
| and I will weigh less than 90kg by next year.
| bravo22 wrote:
| Because she took things that she knew to be not true and
| said the they were true in order to get money.
|
| She didn't say we hope to work with the US Army or that we
| plan to. She said that units were in use by them.
|
| She didn't say the devices are on the verge of being used
| to analyze blood samples. She said that they were indeed
| being used to analyze a high percentage of the samples.
|
| Many, many other examples.
|
| That's the plain definition of fraud.
|
| When the speaker implies uncertainty it is difficult for
| the investor to claim fraud because uncertainty was
| expressed to them. That the speaker "knows" the 95% figure
| is BS is very difficult to prove and generally everyone
| treats it as BS/puffing anyways.
|
| If you could easily show that the CEO saying hitting the
| next milestone is 95% in the bag but in fact it is
| impossible AND they said so to others in private then that
| would also be prosecutable fraud.
| seanw444 wrote:
| Seems very presumptuous to assume Musk knows that he won't
| hit his goals. Most people make goals to try to hit them.
| He probably was bent on achieving that, and hit a snag.
| lucideer wrote:
| Of all the things to call Musk out on (especially in comments
| on a case about misconduct in the field of medicine), making
| bad company sales forecasts is hardly it.
| ubermonkey wrote:
| There's a whole thing at work here that basically goes to
| credibility and obvious intention.
|
| I don't know anybody who hears Musk talk and thinks "that's a
| true statement." He's a circus barker. We might call him a
| bullshitter -- he's making a big noise, but nobody really
| thinks he means most of what he says.
|
| Musk has spent years building this persona, and so people
| generally treat him with the level of credibility he has
| established he deserves.
|
| I still think he's being dishonest _at best_ , but the rational
| world's response to "gee I bet my life savings on his robot
| taxi prediction" would be ridicule.
|
| Holmes presented herself at all times as deadly fucking
| serious, and got incensed and rage-angry when questioned. She's
| in a different category here, I think.
| rcoveson wrote:
| I don't think this would hold up in court, and I hope it
| wouldn't persuade a jury. One of the things that jumps out at
| me is that those two different perceptions, "circus barker"
| versus "deadly fucking serious", are highly subjective.
| Gender-biased, even. On of the things that women in STEM
| often complain about is our willingness to smile at a man
| being stern while shaking our heads at a woman acting that
| way. That's not to say I disagree with you in this instance;
| I actually see it the exact same way. Musk is a head-in-the-
| clouds showman type while Holmes was sober and stoic. I just
| wouldn't trust myself to make an actual ruling based on those
| perceptions, and I'd hope our legal system doesn't either.
|
| The real difference between the two that I see is that Musk's
| borderline-fraudulent statements are intermingled with true
| statements about the actual companies he operates and the
| actual things they do. That's what buys you some slack to
| make outlandish statements: Accomplishing outlandish things.
| If Holmes had normalized electric cars or launched some
| reusable rockets, and had then staked (some of) the
| reputation of one of those companies on claims about a non-
| existent blood test, there may not have been a trial.
| astura wrote:
| Elon Musk has been in trouble for his tweets in the past
|
| https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/making-sense/why-elon-m...
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/oct/28/elon-musk...
| kraigspear wrote:
| There is a difference between will have, and does have.
| TigeriusKirk wrote:
| The initial HN discussion of Theranos in 2013
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6349349
| rrdharan wrote:
| Great / prescient comment here:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6349808
| fortran77 wrote:
| Good! Now indict the board members and the Stanford professor-
| consultants.
| rStar wrote:
| evancoop wrote:
| The relevant detail, in my mind, is not whether Holmes deserves
| punishment, or even how much. The relevant detail is how the
| judge ultimately sentences Holmes, and more importantly, on what
| basis the judge selects the upper or lower range of possible
| sentencing outcomes. Considering that BS, stretching of
| capabilities, and so on are commonplace in the startup world, the
| point isn't whether Holmes crossed the line (she did), but
| rather, how exactly that line is repositioned by this precedent.
|
| There's the easy story: "Young, ambitious wunderkind founder
| falls from grace." And the hard story: "Here's what might be
| relevant for future founders."
| KaiserPro wrote:
| > There's the easy story: "Young, ambitious wunderkind founder
| falls from grace." And the hard story: "Here's what might be
| relevant for future founders." There's the easy story: "Young,
| ambitious wunderkind founder falls from grace." And the hard
| story: "Here's what might be relevant for future founders."
|
| I don't think thats quite correct.
|
| Holmes committed fraud, the part that seemed to sink her was
| attaching other company's names to literature.
|
| However most of us would have assumed the bit that _should_
| have nailed her and a lot of the executive committee is the
| industrial fraud of individual, vulnerable patients.
|
| THeranos was only able to commit this fraud because of the
| breathless, non critical PR pumped out by tech "journalism"
| nathanyz wrote:
| Lying in both startups and even later stage companies has been
| way too accepted in the recent past. Granted investors should
| be doing better due diligence in general, but the amount of
| acceptable deception going on is mind blowing when you get a
| chance to see behind the curtain.
|
| My hope is that a precedent is set that you can boast and talk
| about the future, but claiming something to be true which is
| patently false should be fraud. I believe that is already the
| definition of the word fraud, but would be better for all if
| the legal system enforces that.
| lbriner wrote:
| The definition of fraud is to make false representation for
| "gain". In many cases, lying is not automatically fraud. The
| burden of proof is also on the prosecution so if you claim,
| "Salesforce will transform your business" and someone says it
| doesn't then they have to prove.
|
| 1) A reasonable person would understand the statement as fact
| rather than hyperbole 2) You have objectively not been
| transformed in your business 3) The problems are caused
| solely by your understanding of the Salesforce product and
| not just that you are a bad business owner
|
| So that's why some things sit in the grey area.
| engineeringwoke wrote:
| It's not a grey area. It's simply not enforced. If you're
| an investor and you find out that the co-founders gave you
| bad numbers to juice the next round (this is common to the
| extent that I have personally seen it multiple times), you
| have no incentive to get the law involved. You would lose
| your entire investment, instead of just some of it.
|
| And oftentimes, the extra juice gives them enough runway to
| make things work. Cheaters win, that's the way it is.
| WalterBright wrote:
| The more I think about it, the more parallels with Bernie
| Madoff!
| CRConrad wrote:
| > If you're an investor and you find out that the co-
| founders gave you bad numbers to juice the next round
| [...] you have no incentive to get the law involved. You
| would lose your entire investment, instead of just some
| of it.
|
| > And oftentimes, the extra juice gives them enough
| runway to make things work.
|
| Above all, it gives _you_ [1] time: To cash out that
| investment. Sell it to some later bigger sucker who doesn
| 't already know or suspect what you know or suspect,
| maybe even at some more modest profit -- not making any
| loss _at all!_ -- in stead of the super-jackpot you 'd
| been hoping for if it were a "unicorn".
|
| Early investors who start to smell a rat don't only lack
| an incentive to raise the alarm, they have a positive
| incentive to keep the lid on the story.
|
| ___
|
| [1]: The editorial "you", the hypothetical early(ish)
| investor.
| himinlomax wrote:
| > "Salesforce will transform your business" and someone
| says it doesn't then they have to prove.
|
| You'd have to prove that Salesforce didn't believe they
| could transform your business, not that they didn't do the
| transformation.
| MartinCron wrote:
| Claims like "transform your business" or "best pizza in
| town" are generally considered non-specific puffery and
| aren't subject to fraud or false advertising
| enforcements.
|
| Something like "perform n lab tests with a single drop of
| blood" is a very specific claim.
| deegles wrote:
| Also, that statement doesn't say it will transform it in a
| _good_ way :)
| geophile wrote:
| I think there is a pretty sharp line separating what Holmes
| tried, and what legitimate startups do. What she claimed had no
| basis in reality. It's Borat trying to patent a hoverboard,
| just like in Back to the Future, and telling the VC that he
| "needs to come up with the science"
| (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OXuDhejxz_c). Except that
| Holmes was worse, claiming that she had the science.
|
| And she insulated herself from scrutiny by packing the board
| with old powerful men. So old that their critical thinking
| skills were on the decline (e.g. George Schultz, as described
| in Carreyrou's book), and whose expertise was NOT in the
| relevant subject areas.
|
| Holmes was obviously corrupt from the beginning.
| m3047 wrote:
| > It's Borat trying to patent a hoverboard
|
| Wow! That's interesting! While nobody has been paying
| attention, forward-looking patents have become acceptable (I
| don't agree that this is a good thing). Seriously, that's a
| fact; and here comes Holmes apparently claiming to have the
| science, am I right? There is language which apparently
| (IANAL) needs to be watched especially around verb tense when
| filing such patents.
| lokar wrote:
| Was there really _no_ science at all? I 've not followed the
| details, but I assumed she had something, but that it was
| just unworkable now or anytime soon
| geophile wrote:
| It's been a while since I read the book, but I don't recall
| any scientific basis at all. Pure hoverboard.
| bumby wrote:
| I haven't read Carreyrou's book, but do you think age and
| stereotypical gender roles played a part in the swindle? In
| other words, did the "old powerful men" let their guard down
| more because she was a young female?
| geophile wrote:
| Absolutely. It is hard for me to believe that Holmes didn't
| intentionally seek out powerful, influential yet clueless
| men. The fact that she had connections to them certainly
| made things simpler.
|
| I remember first hearing about Theranos in the New Yorker
| profile of Holmes. The presence of Schultz, Kissinger and
| other non-scientist powerful old men struck me as extremely
| odd at the time. And given her youth and appearance, it is
| impossible not to speculate about her effect on them,
| intentional or not.
|
| Also, the book made it very clear that Schultz's judgement
| was clouded by personal feelings. He blew up his
| relationship with his grandson over his defense of Holmes;
| the grandson saw what was going on.
| WalterBright wrote:
| I would not underestimate the powerful effect of a young,
| attractive woman flattering an old man.
| schnitzelstoat wrote:
| Carreyrou's book is really good and I strongly recommend it
| - it's made clear in the book that a lot of them had family
| friendship connections to Holmes as well.
|
| I imagine this may also have clouded their judgement.
| yawaworht1978 wrote:
| I always wonder why people who buy Tesla's fsd think that is
| any different.
|
| The company literally tells them the hardware is there, it's
| "only" missing the software.
|
| Like, what's a robot worth without the undeveloped software.
| baby wrote:
| > And the hard story: "Here's what might be relevant for future
| founders."
|
| Honestly, these founders are crap. I met a lot of different
| types of founders, there are a lot of snake oil sellers out
| there, and then there are the good ones. I'm willing to bet
| that nothing good came out of the snake oil sellers.
| jasode wrote:
| _> Considering that BS, stretching of capabilities, and so on
| are commonplace in the startup world, the point isn't whether
| Holmes crossed the line (she did), but rather, how exactly that
| line is repositioned by this precedent._
|
| I really don't see the line being repositioned at all because
| typical founder bs and Holme's fraud have a clear difference:
|
| - bs is often overinflated promises of the _future_ that don't
| come true ; E.g. Musk overpromises fully-self-driving cars next
| year blah blah blah
|
| - fraud is often lying about the _past_ with falsified
| documents etc. E.g. Holmes deliberately fabricated "military
| contracts" that didn't exist and forged papers with supposed
| Pfizer endorsements to trick investors to wire money. Likewise,
| Madoff faked the so-called fund's audited statements showing
| profitable trades. Therefore, convictions of wire fraud charges
| are easier to prosecute.
|
| Holme's guilty convictions really have no relevance to the pie-
| in-the-sky overconfidence of founders. Therefore, unrealistic
| projections will continue to be made.
|
| Is there any credible evidence showing Elon Musk falsified
| documents and fabricated income to trick investors into
| SpaceX/Tesla?
| wiz21c wrote:
| > pie-in-the-sky overconfidence of founders
|
| I always wonder do they really are overconfident, or are they
| so because somehow they think they would miss opportunities
| if they are less overconfident than their competitors ?
|
| It sounds much like advertising always selling you things
| using very ambiguous wording in order to make you dream. For
| me that's just lying.
| bumby wrote:
| This is a documented bias in civil projects and one of the
| factors of why they are notoriously over schedule and over
| budget.
|
| An optimism bias leads naive project managers to gauge cost
| and schedule on best case scenarios. Less naive managers
| then have to give equally optimistic projections, just to
| have a hope of getting funded even if they know the
| projections are wrong.
| bumby wrote:
| Maybe someone with a legal background can weigh in more
| intelligently, but skimming through the US Code that she was
| actually convicted of doesn't make any distinction between
| past and future. Most of it is centered around claims of
| material fact (i.e., not subjective) and intentional and
| realized damage.
|
| I think some of the grey area with Musk is the marketing of
| the product, like terming it "autopilot" which has a very
| specific connotation in the public perception. I'm granting
| that's not fraud in the same sense as the Theranos case, but
| I think it (probably deliberately) walks into a grey area of
| ethics. I think the damage claim is readily apparent but the
| intentional claim may be more difficult, in part because I
| don't think there is a standardized definition of
| "autopilot", even if it knowingly means something specific to
| the general public.
|
| If I create an EV model named the "ThousandMiler" but put an
| asterisk in the manual that says it's only capable of 500
| miles, maybe that's not fraud but it's skirting the line.
| ethbr0 wrote:
| The worst possible outcome of this, and I hope clarification
| presses this, would be "You can't lie and bend the truth in
| _biology_ startups, but can everywhere else. "
|
| Which would effectively siphon money away from an already hard
| but critical space.
|
| The jury found Holmes guilty. But she should have been found
| just as guilty if she'd been running an adtech startup or a
| crypto company.
| snek_case wrote:
| I don't think it's just about biotech startups. I think the
| obvious distinction here is that her behavior put lives at
| risk fairly directly. Theranos was administering blood tests
| to a large number of people in a beta program. These tests
| were incomplete and inaccurate. Said tests were used to
| monitor the status/recurrence of cancers and other conditions
| like diabetes.
|
| If you similarly put people's lives or safety in danger with
| an AI startup somehow (with enough of a lack of ethics, this
| might be possible), you too could be eligible to win an all
| expenses paid vacation.
| dpierce9 wrote:
| "This case was specifically about what Holmes told Theranos
| investors, although her lies also impacted partners and
| patients."
|
| This had nothing to do with patients though I am sure the
| patient angle helped underscore the lies to investors.
| ineedasername wrote:
| The actual convictions didn't have anything to do with
| patients, but if there hadn't been a direct human safety
| aspect to this then I doubt it would have received as
| much attention, and maybe not even prosecution. I really
| don't think much would have happened to her if this had
| been an AI startup claiming to use ground breaking
| techniques (black box) to achieve nearly general purpose
| AI, when in fact they were just using bog standard
| methods in xgboost or TensorFlow.
| merpnderp wrote:
| They weren't also testing these people with approved
| methods? Who would sign up for that and how is that legal
| or ethical? Even if she hadn't been lying these people were
| gambling their lives against the success of her company.
| fourseventy wrote:
| Exactly, that is why she is in so much trouble
| ethbr0 wrote:
| To be fair, a big reason she probably _wasn 't_ convicted
| on the patient fraud charges (she took the investor fraud
| charges) was because one of the things she lied about was
| _not_ testing people with Theranos methods.
|
| I.e. what Theranos said "We're testing you using our
| novel testing systems" vs what Theranos was actually
| doing "We're testing you using a standard test system"
|
| So, most people who got Theranos tests were lied to, but
| in a way with a more positive outcome for them.
| vasilipupkin wrote:
| B.S. and fraud are two different things though. BS in the
| startup world is commonplace, but not fraud.
| acegopher wrote:
| What's the difference? Aren't both knowingly lying to affect
| an outcome?
| Manuel_D wrote:
| There's a difference between optimistically saying
| "Everyone is going to want our super expensive juice
| maker!" versus telling investors that you have built 1,000
| functional juice makers when in fact the juice makers don't
| work.
|
| The former is an optimistic projection of demand. It's not
| a lie if it turns out not to be true, since it's a
| prediction. The latter is a lie: it's telling somebody
| something that is objectively and unambiguously false.
| CapitalistCartr wrote:
| Fraud is lying to get money. If you lie to stroke your ego,
| or similar such behavior, it's not fraud, unless you gain
| wealth by it.
| vasilipupkin wrote:
| B.S. is in the eye of the beholder. I can start a company
| and ask you to invest in it because it will be worth 3
| trillion in 20 years. It may be BS in your eyes, but I
| might believe there is a real chance of success. Fraud is
| different, fraud is blatantly concealing or
| misprepresenting certain facts.
| ska wrote:
| > What's the difference? Aren't both knowingly lying to
| affect an outcome?
|
| "This product will revolutionize the industry", "We are
| going to disrupt X", etc. is usually BS, based on
| irrational optimism about the future. Of course, in the
| unlikely case that it comes true, they will say you "had
| vision"
|
| "I have a working prototype, and if you give me $Xmm we'll
| productize it". If you don't in fact have a working
| prototype, this is fraud.
| [deleted]
| manaman wrote:
| From a quick look, no patients were harmed? Am I missing
| something?
| Bellend wrote:
| EH took money from idiots and lost it all. Elon Musk is next
| only he took the idiots monopoly shares and converted it into
| actual fiat.
| [deleted]
| mindracer wrote:
| I think something like a million results were voided as they're
| were deemed unreliable. I don't know if that put anyone at risk
| though
| asah wrote:
| Of course she's guilty and should get a long prison sentence.
|
| But is it realistic to assume founders will self-police given the
| pressures? Or should we expect investors to look at these BIG
| WARNING SIGNS and do more due diligence??? Seriously, having no
| subject matter experts on the board etc is ridiculous and all the
| valley insiders knew it. One call to her thesis advisor is all
| the due diligence they needed to do.
|
| Put another way, is the next Elizabeth Holmes going to be
| deterred by her prison sentence? Was she deterred by Bernie
| Madoff or 100s of others?
|
| Again obviously they just wanted to nail her on something and
| didn't have enough evidence for the reason crime, which was lying
| to end users about their healthcare.
|
| And obviously it's illegal and bad and wrong to lie to investors
| duh.
|
| I'm just saying that perhaps we shouldn't use self-policing or
| the courts to solve the startup-investor-fraud problem because
| they're (a) ineffective, (b) we have other & better ways to solve
| this, (c) solution b leads to the more efficient market and
| therefore the greater innovation and therefore wins.
| onislandtime wrote:
| One of the surprising things in this saga is how Walgreens
| partnered with Theranos. I actually had a blood test done in the
| downtown Palo Alto Walgreens. The results were obviously wrong so
| I had to redo them in a real lab. Any elementary school child can
| do a science experiment comparing the blood test results of
| Theranos with a standard lab. Walgreens deliberately failed to do
| due diligence because of some type of corruption. They
| contributed to the fraud and they should be investigated.
| holografix wrote:
| It's fascinating, albeit useless as it's all speculation, to
| consider Holmes' mentality and tactics.
|
| As a young and attractive woman she carefully manicured her
| appearance to resemble Steve Jobs and consistently altered her
| tone of voice (!) to sound deeper. To investors she was the
| disarmingly beautiful genius. These old grey men should be so
| lucky as to get her attention and be part of her myth!
|
| To a much older, rich, well connected, megalomaniac controlling
| man she was the young disciple. Ready to inflate his sense of
| self by "needing" direction and castigation. Not to mention the
| sexual dynamic.
|
| To the jury she's pregnant mother, victim of a culture that only
| rewards winning and the fragile, abused partner of an abusive
| man. She never meant any of it, it's all a big misunderstanding!
|
| Neumann has nothing on Holmes!
| stareblinkstare wrote:
| [deleted]
| kyleblarson wrote:
| I hadn't followed Theranos much until the trial but listened to
| the American Scandal podcast about it. I find the narration to be
| a bit cheesy but it was pretty informative for just a few hours
| of listening while exercising:
| https://podcasts.apple.com/my/podcast/theranos-startup/id143...
| the_doctah wrote:
| I can also recommend the book Bad Blood (Carreyrou 2018)
| Apocryphon wrote:
| Looking forward to JLaw's portrayal of Holmes in Adam McKay's
| Apple Studios adaptation of _Bad Blood_. Hope they pick up from
| where the book ended and cover this trial.
|
| https://variety.com/2021/film/news/jennifer-lawrence-elizabe...
| paxys wrote:
| That project has been in the works for many years now, and is
| no closer to seeing the light of day. Hulu's miniseries 'The
| Dropout', with Amanda Seyfried, debuts in March though.
| Apocryphon wrote:
| Maybe they're closer to it now that they've just successfully
| released another movie on another streaming service.
| celticninja wrote:
| JLaw?
| cercatrova wrote:
| Jennifer Lawrence
| robertakarobin wrote:
| JLaw == Jennifer Lawrence
| csours wrote:
| I wish to god it was Jude Law though.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| jonwachob91 wrote:
| It blows my mind that she was found guilty for defrauding
| investors, but not guilty for defrauding patients about their
| test results.
|
| Investors know that every dollar they put into a company could
| disappear, it's why startups get capital from investors and not
| bank loans.
|
| But a patient does not expect for their blood test results to be
| completely wrong. Her tests weren't giving false-negatives or
| false-positives, they were using lab techniques that we have
| known to be inaccurate for decades. She knowingly sold Walgreens
| on 1 test, and then performed a different test.
|
| I need to sit down and properly inform myself about how the
| prosecutors fucked that up so badly.
| lr4444lr wrote:
| It upsets me, but I wouldn't say "blows my mind". Prosecutors
| need to focus their strike where the charges are the strongest
| against well armored defendants. The people who suffered
| health-wise will now be able to more easily win civil suits,
| which will help them more than adding jail time to her
| impending swntence.
| Someone wrote:
| FTA: _"This case was specifically about what Holmes told
| Theranos investors, although her lies also impacted partners
| and patients."_
|
| If that's true, it isn't surprising she wasn't found guilty for
| defrauding patients, and more cases (?maybe one focusing on
| partners and one focusing on patients?) could follow. I don't
| know whether something like that is in the pipeline.
|
| Edit: reading https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Holmes#Cr
| iminal_char..., that's unlikely to happen:
|
| _"In February 2020, Holmes 's defense requested a federal
| court to drop all charges against her and her co-defendant
| Balwani. A federal judge examined the charges and ruled that
| some charges should be dropped: since the Theranos blood tests
| were paid for by medical insurance companies, the patients were
| not deprived of any money or property. Prosecutors would hence
| not be allowed to argue that doctors and patients were fraud
| victims. However, the judge kept the 11 charges of wire fraud"_
|
| I think that leaves open prosecuting for something else than
| fraud for knowingly delivering unreliable test results, but
| wouldn't know what that "something else" would be.
| starfallg wrote:
| Yes, negligence would be that something else.
|
| Theranos had a duty of care to the patients and they very
| blatantly breached that duty.
|
| Fraud deals with purely financial loss, while negligence
| deals with harm which is much wider in scope.
| Nasrudith wrote:
| Yeah negligence is a better fit. Their process sucked
| unacceptably and they knew it but they didn't set out to
| lie with test results or never performed them.
|
| I think they might have contracted out tests to real labs
| which could be fraud but that would be both harder to link
| to Holmes and potentially defensible. Imagine an alternate
| world with a Nega-Theranos which actually had machines
| which worked but were say five percentage points less
| accurate. Say Nega-Theranos used some patient samples with
| enough blood that way to check their accuracy in
| comparison. Technically not the machines they advertised
| but still done in patient interests.
|
| We don't have a NegaTheranos and there were biophysical and
| statistical constraints which made the concept flawed from
| the start (not all blood sources are identical in the
| person and statistical limitations) . The smart thing to do
| was not try that method from the start. The ethical thing
| would be to tell the board and let them decide if they
| should dissolve the venture or try to pivot to another
| approach or task. It would be stupidly harder to try to
| identify the contents of blood non-invasively but actually
| possible. There are already several insulin only blood
| scanners in trial or development by multiple companies.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Their process sucked unacceptably and they knew it but
| they didn't set out to lie with test results
|
| They lied about what test they were doing, and people
| paid them based on that lie. While the jury here may be
| correct that that wasn't federal wire fraud by Holmes
| personally, it absolutely was a fraud by Theranos.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Fraud deals with purely financial loss
|
| False. Fraud deals with any time in which something of
| value (not just something financial) is obtained under
| false pretenses, and (where civil damages or criminal
| restitution is sought/awarded for it) can address all
| compensable harms resulting from the misrepresentation, not
| just loss that was financial in character (the restitution
| will be financial, of course, but that's also true of
| negligence.)
| starfallg wrote:
| Loss of property or of value is still monetary loss,
| which is financial. The fact is that for fraud, you much
| prove that something of value has been lost.
| necovek wrote:
| I am neither American nor a native English speaker, but I
| always thought fraud was mostly a deliberate action, and
| negligence was mostly resulting out of either lack of
| action or accidental consequences of an action.
|
| So if a company deliberately and knowingly markets a
| "sepsis-test" that puts out completely random results and
| leads to people getting their limbs amputated (bear with
| me, I know the example is terrible), they can only be held
| responsible for "negligence" by those patients? Or would
| patients only be able to claim financial loss due to
| fraudulent loss of work ability and such?
|
| There was similar reporting of those prenatal genetic tests
| a few days ago (they have led to unnecessary pregnancy
| abortions due to incorrect results), and I wonder what
| corrective action we can do to ensure these things don't
| happen?
| toyg wrote:
| Negligence is not an absolute concept, there is a scale
| going from accidental to willful - which is where it
| borders on fraud. The legal definitions around these
| terms are complex, because the difference between gross
| negligence, willful misconduct, and outright fraud, can
| often be philosophical more than practical. In your
| example, I reckon that the random tests would be
| considered willfully negligent.
| Someone wrote:
| I'm not a lawyer, but the Wikipedia part I quoted gives
| me the impression that, in US law or maybe the specific
| state this case was in, "fraud" is _legally_ defined
| "depriving somebody of any money or property".
|
| Again assuming Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N
| egligence#Procedure_in_the_Un...) has this right,
| _negligence_ requires injury ( _"The United States
| generally recognizes four elements to a negligence
| action: duty, breach, proximate causation and injury. A
| plaintiff who makes a negligence claim must prove all
| four elements of negligence in order to win his or her
| case"_
|
| "Injury" _may_ have a wider meaning in US law than
| elsewhere, though. Wikipedia gives me
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_injury, which says
| _"Personal injury is a legal term for an injury to the
| body, mind or emotions, as opposed to an injury to
| property"_ , so properties can be injured, too, and
| https://dictionary.law.com/Default.aspx?selected=1646
| sort-of shows that's a synonym for "property damage".
| schoen wrote:
| > "In February 2020, Holmes's defense requested a federal
| court to drop all charges against her and her co-defendant
| Balwani. A federal judge examined the charges and ruled that
| some charges should be dropped: since the Theranos blood
| tests were paid for by medical insurance companies, the
| patients were not deprived of any money or property.
| Prosecutors would hence not be allowed to argue that doctors
| and patients were fraud victims. However, the judge kept the
| 11 charges of wire fraud"
|
| I don't know anything about that ruling except what you've
| quoted from Wikipedia, but didn't many of the patients have
| to make coinsurance payments for these tests? I just paid a
| medical bill today with a coinsurance component, and so both
| I and my insurance carrier have now paid for those medical
| services.
|
| I also wonder about whether getting people to have a
| fraudulent medical test (which might cause some amount of
| pain or anxiety, especially for people who are afraid of
| needles) could have been a cognizable harm even if they
| didn't have to pay money to undergo it. But I realize that
| the law will often distinguish between suffering and losses
| of tangible property for many purposes.
| detaro wrote:
| > _I also wonder about whether getting people to have a
| fraudulent medical test (which might cause some amount of
| pain or anxiety, especially for people who are afraid of
| needles) could have been a cognizable harm_
|
| If I remember right one of the witnesses was a woman who
| got a false-positive HIV test result, so they probably went
| for that angle.
| pdpi wrote:
| This is a criminal case, which follows stricter rules than
| civil action. The relationship between Holmes personally and
| the investors is clear enough, but I can see how any claim of
| her committing fraud against the patients is much subtler and
| much likelier to fail.
| stock_toaster wrote:
| > It blows my mind that she was found guilty for defrauding
| investors, but not guilty for defrauding patients about their
| test results.
|
| Not excusing it, but maybe it was a company vs personal thing
| (eg. consumer harm perhaps didn't pierce the corporate
| veil[1]). Whereas Fraud against investors is much more of a
| personal/individual thing.
|
| [1]:
| https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/piercing_the_corporate_veil
| rectang wrote:
| In other words, successful "fraud laundering".
| gjsman-1000 wrote:
| Don't forget she is still facing 3 counts that were declared
| mistrialed. She could get longer.
| isolli wrote:
| Could it be related to the "Everything is securities fraud" [0]
| theory?
|
| If it's easier to prove that someone defrauded investors, then
| this is what prosecutors will go for.
|
| Side note: I highly recommend subscribing to Matt Levine's
| newsletter.
|
| [0]
| https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-02-03/goldma...
|
| > As I often write, this theory can turn anything bad that a
| public company does into securities fraud [...] The stock will
| drop (because the bad things are bad for the company); the
| shareholders will sue, saying "you said you were good, we
| believed you, we bought the stock, but you were bad and we lost
| money." And so climate change and sexual harassment and lax
| customer data protections and mistreatment of orcas can all be
| transmuted into securities fraud.
| spoonjim wrote:
| Cf. Sacklers.
| helsinkiandrew wrote:
| "Everything is securities fraud".
|
| I can't find details of the specific wire fraud charges that
| she was found guilty of, but it is far easier to find and prove
| technical breeches of law (documents showing X was claimed to
| investors to obtain money when other documents show it wasn't
| true) than proving intent or knowledge by the accused
| beforehand.
| alanh wrote:
| Money Stuff reader detected (Me too)
| bellyfullofbac wrote:
| Iirc with Fyre Festival the dude got convicted of wire fraud
| for defrauding an investor, not for selling tickets to a sham
| festival. The joke was, screw the small people, that's fine,
| screw a rich investor, that's when you go to jail...
| schoen wrote:
| "Everything is securities fraud"
|
| https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-06-26/everyt.
| ..
| mardifoufs wrote:
| It's more that wire fraud can cover pretty much anything,
| making it a lot easier for the feds to get a conviction.
| Plus, the charges weren't related to the festival or its
| investors; it was for a whole different scammy "venture."
|
| I'm not even sure they could be criminally charged for a sham
| festival since the festival did actually happen. I'd imagine
| that the whole thing turning out to be a complete wreck would
| probably be something that could be handled in a civil case.
| nopenopenopeno wrote:
| Juries are not the brightest bunch. Anyone with even the most
| fleeting ability for critical thought can avoid jury duty. This
| is by design, of course.
| nroach wrote:
| Some people choose to serve on juries out of a sense of civic
| responsibility and don't seek exclusion.
| nopenopenopeno wrote:
| Why would I believe that happens to any measurable extent?
| I mean, sounds nice but it also sounds like a fairy tale.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| That oneself and one's peers are smart and most everyone
| else is an idiot is an even more enticing fairy tale.
| bigbillheck wrote:
| A couple years ago the only reason I wasn't on a jury was
| because I wasn't one of the people whose name was
| randomly drawn, after they'd filtered out everybody who
| was unable to serve or had other conflicts that would
| make them unfit (such as 'visceral opinions about the
| nature of the charges').
|
| Could I have gotten out of it? Sure. Could I have gotten
| out of it without lying under oath? I don't see how.
| hatware wrote:
| > It blows my mind that she was found guilty for defrauding
| investors, but not guilty for defrauding patients about their
| test results.
|
| Maybe it's just me, but with all the anti-consumer practices
| going on, it doesn't surprise me in the least. Gotta protect
| those profits.
| TheCondor wrote:
| Are Walgreen's customers given any sort of guarantee about the
| results?
|
| I mean, if you could find someone that experience material loss
| from it, or death, I think they'd have a very legitimate chance
| to sue. It's not clear to me what promises Walgreen's is
| actually making though.
| InfiniteRand wrote:
| How does it work in a case where the customer's relationship
| is with a reseller, but the reseller was given false
| information from the test maker? Is only the test maker
| liable, or are both the reseller and test maker liable?
| sundvor wrote:
| Well, they got Al Capone on tax evasion...
|
| In my own mind, the test result fraud is far worse ethically -
| however as long as she is locked up, it still works.
| lbriner wrote:
| This wouldn't be satisfying. It is hard to accept that one
| person was responsible for all of the dishonesty. Even if you
| were "only" the CFO or COO, you must know what is happening
| in the company. What about all of the scientists who must
| have knowingly been reporting results that were not
| consistent with best (or legal) practice?
|
| There is obviously a culture issue with "white collar" crime
| and a large hole in most countries ability to correctly
| police what is and isn't acceptable. There are also questions
| around "business secrets" and how these were used to justify
| a lack of scrutiny or due-diligence.
| simplicio wrote:
| Just going by Carryous podcast, it seems like there was a lot
| more hard evidence (emails, transcripts, texts, etc) that she
| was knowingly lying to investors. On the other hand, I don't
| think there was any hard proof that she didnt know the results
| delivered by her labs (which were using third party machines,
| albeit ones being used improperly), were bunk.
| chihuahua wrote:
| I feel like John Carreyrou deserves a medal for exposing the
| entire scam. First in WSJ articles and then in his book,
| which is a great read. It's incredible how much trouble this
| caused for him when Theranos tried to fight him.
|
| Who knows how long the scam would have continued without him,
| and how many more people would have gotten bogus test
| results.
|
| If Tiger Woods can get a presidential medal of freedom for
| playing golf, it seems like it's the least they could do for
| Carreyrou.
| alanh wrote:
| I agree the proof for defrauding investors was less arguable.
| However there were still clear indications that she should
| have known the tests offered to patients were unreliable. For
| example, Schultz told her, before resigning, that it was not
| OK for Theranos to continue re-running their benchmark tests
| until they got a passing result (kind of like shaking the
| magic 8 ball until it, on the fourth shake, correctly answers
| the question "Is today Sunday?" -- then selling it as an
| oracle). One employee flagged it for her attention that
| females were getting results that should only be possible if
| they had prostates -- and she dismissed this as well! There
| was other evidence introduced during court that showed she
| knew the tests her company was doing for customers were not
| as accurate as she claimed, too. I would have loved to see
| her found guilty on these counts as a result, and I would
| also love to hear about the jurors' reasoning for not doing
| so.
| bee_rider wrote:
| Is this actually the end of her legal trouble? I assumed they
| were pushing the financial stuff because it is relatively easy
| to prove, and would go after her for more serious medical
| crimes over time.
| jjav wrote:
| > It blows my mind that she was found guilty for defrauding
| investors, but not guilty for defrauding patients about their
| test results.
|
| Exactly. This is the exact opposite of the justice I'd expect.
|
| Invest money? Expect to lose it most of the time, that's the
| game.
|
| Pay for a service? There should be an expectation of honest
| delivery of said service.
| harha wrote:
| Makes me wonder how much of the rapidly established covid
| testing infrastructure around the world delivers actual
| results.
|
| Fun fact: In some places like Singapore you don't even get the
| chance to test again to verify the result, you just serve your
| time in quarantine and then get back your "safe" status.
| ghshephard wrote:
| Probably for the best back in populations of close to 0
| community incidence, low acquired immunity, and prior to the
| vaccines being available. Better to have a few hundred (few
| thousand?) people incorrectly spend time in quarantine, than
| to have community spread results in people/businesses being
| locked down.
| harha wrote:
| That's the state right now with almost all of the
| population vaccinated.
|
| I don't think it's for the best, it ignores any other
| medical conditions and offers no way to double check a
| result that could come from a dodgy test center.
| ghshephard wrote:
| I think once their is some population immunity, that you
| start to put more effort into confirming people really
| are infectious. It's partially why I don't think the CDC
| rules about not requiring a test after the fifth day
| really matters in most places in the United States - 20+%
| of people _in the general population_ are already
| infected in places like New York. Wearing a mask for 5
| days after quarantining for 5 days, while not ideal -
| ensures that our medical and logistic and other critical
| systems keep working for the next 3-4 weeks.
| gbear605 wrote:
| At least in the last few months, at-home tests have been
| available to replicate lab results, and they seem to be
| consistent.
| sampo wrote:
| > Makes me wonder how much of the rapidly established covid
| testing infrastructure around the world delivers actual
| results.
|
| There was a scammy company is Sweden that wrote everyone
| negative covid results, without actually bothering to analyze
| the samples:
|
| https://www.euractiv.com/section/politics/short_news/swedish.
| ..
| amirkdv wrote:
| Except for PCR has been around for decades and its basic
| principles are taught in first year molecular biology
| courses.
|
| Whereas Theranos' newfangled secret "innovation" was ...
| well, a secret throughout.
| [deleted]
| harha wrote:
| Yeah that was sketchy right from the pitch.
|
| But even with the established PCR tests and with all the
| theatre around it, I doubt that this quantity of testing is
| being performed up to the highest standards and there are a
| bunch of "entrepreneurs" in this space too who may benefit
| from little supervision or consequences.
| native_samples wrote:
| Blood tests have also been around decades and are taught to
| first year students. The devil is in the details.
|
| In this case the people claiming COVID PCR tests were bogus
| were right. The US CDC has now admitted it. They recently
| changed their testing rules to stop PCR testing people at
| the end of their self isolation period because PCR tests
| can stay positive for up to 12 weeks whilst being clinical
| false positives, and thus (Rochelle Walensky's words) "we
| would have people in isolation for a very long time if we
| were relying on PCRs" [1]. Nothing changed to prompt this -
| no new science or discovery or anything like that. They
| just suddenly noticed something that random bloggers knew
| in April 2020: that COVID PCR positives don't imply you're
| infectious. Also note the use of the word "would" and not
| "did"; apparently she's in denial about what happened here.
|
| There are lots of other issues with them beyond the cold
| positive problems of course. In theory PCR tests are
| precise because they triangulate the presence of at least
| three genes. In the beginning that's what they looked for.
| Over time that's slipped and they're now routinely
| reporting PCR tests as positive if they only detect a
| single gene. I took a PCR last week where the certificate
| stated outright they only looked for one gene.
|
| This crops up in other ways. To detect Omicron, they were
| taking PCR tests that failed to trigger on one gene (thus
| technically should have been classed as negative) and then
| treated them as positives, being sent for sequencing to
| determine if they were Omicron or not. But only samples
| with Ct <= 30 were sent. They use this threshold when
| normally even 40 is accepted to be a positive (Ct is log
| scale so 40 is a very tiny level of detection compared to
| 30) because it turns out any sample that triggers over 30
| is so destroyed it's unsequenceable. They can't even find
| enough viable virus to know what it is. That doesn't stop
| them classifying such samples as "infectious and must self
| isolate" normally, though.
|
| And all that's before you even get to the cause/effect
| confusion the tests represent.
|
| No, COVID PCR testing is a mess. The only reason Holmes is
| a convict and those guys aren't is that Holmes wanted to be
| the next Steve Jobs, so she worked entirely in the private
| sector. If she'd been selling COVID stuff to the government
| she'd have been fine, even doing the same things.
|
| [1] https://abcnews.go.com/Health/live-
| updates/coronavirus/?id=8...
| taf2 wrote:
| Didn't the FDA approve her tests...
|
| Yup - https://www.businessinsider.com/theranos-gets-fda-
| approval-2...
| phonon wrote:
| That was just one test, for Herpes.
| HWR_14 wrote:
| They approved the Herpes test not all the other tests she was
| selling. And they approved it after they had been selling
| other tests for over a year.
| secondaryacct wrote:
| But then you must charge all the employees who did so, instead
| of her. Her crime is fraud because she told investor one thing
| and commanded employees another.
|
| But it's not the army, they could refuse, they all did the
| tests and gave the false results back to humans, which is
| unfathomable in healthcare. She s eventually responsible but
| her job was on investor relationship.
| HWR_14 wrote:
| > But it's not the army, they could refuse
|
| Officers are not only allowed to, but required to, refuse
| illegal orders in the Army. Enlisted troops are allowed the
| "just following orders" excuse, but not officers who should
| know better.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Enlisted troops are allowed the "just following orders"
| excuse
|
| Within certain bounds; even enlisted can be convicted of
| crimes for following palpably unlawful orders.
| berberous wrote:
| >> Investors know that every dollar they put into a company
| could disappear, it's why startups get capital from investors
| and not bank loans.
|
| The above does not excuse fraud. Investors know their
| investments are risky, but that does not give you permission to
| deliberately lie or mislead, with an intent to deceive the
| potential investor.
|
| For example, if you tell investors that you anticipate getting
| $50M in new contracts over the next year, well, assuming you
| mean it in good faith, that's not fraud even if it doesn't pan
| out or was delusional to begin with.
|
| If you tell an investor you just signed a contract for $50M, in
| order to get them to invest, and that's a total lie, that's
| fraud. Whether or not the investor did appropriate due
| diligence to confirm that fact or not, it's still criminal.
| [deleted]
| chihuahua wrote:
| In one sense you are correct, just because investors are
| knowingly making speculative investments, that doesn't make
| it OK to defraud them.
|
| On the other hand, perhaps the argument was that investors
| know there's a risk and know they should be skeptical. It
| would be unreasonable to expect patients requesting a blood
| test to be suspicious and question the results.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| > On the other hand, perhaps the argument was that
| investors know there's a risk and know they should be
| skeptical.
|
| If you've ever dealt with competent VCs, they _are_ very
| skeptical, which is why they pretty much ignore your
| forward looking statements and just look at your _current_
| data. And the reason they do that is because forward
| looking statements can be all kinds of BS, but current data
| is just facts (unless you 're lying about them, in which
| case it's fraud).
|
| Of course, they also want to know your vision and drive for
| the future, but they'll basically ignore statements like
| "We have 10 big deals I'm the pipeline" and just say "How
| many signed contracts do you have?"
| rossdavidh wrote:
| They weren't really being charged with the stuff about
| patients, in part I think because the communication between
| Holmes and investors was direct, whereas Holmes was not
| personally communicating with the patients. Basically, the
| prosecutors went for the charges that were easier to prove.
|
| If Theranos still existed as a company, it would doubtless be
| getting buried under a blizzard of charges relating to how
| Theranos, the company, treated their patients. One of several
| reasons why Theranos the company no longer exists.
| andrei_says_ wrote:
| What happened to the people working for Holmes/Theranos who
| were doing the legwork of systematically and knowingly
| defrauding patients?
| HWR_14 wrote:
| It's fairly easy to set up situations where the people
| doing the actual work are not knowingly defrauding anyone.
| The salespeople are told the machine is real, the delivery
| people never see inside the lab, the testers inside the lab
| are trained by the few people really in on it (I don't
| think they had the proper independent training) so they
| don't know how bad the tests are, and the scientists think
| everyone knows they're working on version 2.0 but they're
| told not to discuss readiness, leading the salespeople to
| get the wrong idea. Heck, most frauds don't want their
| people to know that it's a fraud - too many people raises
| secrecy and conscience issues.
| andrei_says_ wrote:
| In other words, Theranos was intentionally set up as a
| criminal organization?
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Correct, it is all about what they have a paper trail for. It
| is also very difficult to _prove_ harm to patients. Any
| prosecution would depend on a lot of statistics and
| scientific detective work, which the prosecutors frankly aren
| 't equipped to take on.
|
| Theranos tests gave some inaccurate results, but the defense
| will say Traditional blood tests can be wrong as well. This
| devolves into statistical evaluation of the methods used for
| testing, e.g. if the standard test is 99.9 what was the
| Theranos result?
|
| This is a huge mess, and why the pragmatic charge was
| financial fraud.
| alanh wrote:
| > [She wasn't] really being charged with [wire fraud with
| regard to] patients
|
| Unless the word "really" is doing some _heavy_ lifting here,
| this is incorrect. There were multiple counts directly and
| specifically related to defrauding patients. These counts
| came back not guilty, but they were, in fact, charged, and
| customers testified in court in support of these charges.
| BoardsOfCanada wrote:
| The articles says "This case was specifically about what
| Holmes told Theranos investors, although her lies also
| impacted partners and patients" which I took as the
| patients claims were not part of this trial, but maybe they
| were?
| bryanrasmussen wrote:
| I think I would try to have them as separate trials.
| rossdavidh wrote:
| You're correct, I saw that all of the counts were wire
| fraud or conspiracy to commit wire fraud, and didn't
| realize that they included wire fraud...of patients.
|
| I have to think, though, that the fact that it was such an
| odd charge in relation to patients, had a part in why those
| charges didn't stick. I think wire fraud in relation to
| investors succeeded because it was a much more accurate
| description of the act involved. But you're correct, some
| of the counts that didn't stick were wire fraud related to
| patients.
| a-dub wrote:
| > It blows my mind that she was found guilty for defrauding
| investors, but not guilty for defrauding patients about their
| test results.
|
| my thoughts exactly. i'm woefully underread on the whole
| situation but something is weird and different about it.
|
| one thing that does jump to mind is that the investor list and
| board composition isn't what i'm used to seeing for stem
| ventures. i can imagine that perhaps they're less forgiving of
| failure and were operating with more blind trust in company
| leadership on stem/technology matters.
| 300bps wrote:
| To me it seems like a simple matter of don't mess with people
| that have money.
| csours wrote:
| My impression is that the defense put the onus on the lab
| directors etc and that she didn't know what was going on. I
| don't buy that, but the jury is supposed to go on only
| evidence presented at the trial, so I guess the defense did a
| good job.
| eternalban wrote:
| It's the elephant in the room. Hardly ever remarked upon but
| a complete head scratcher. This company is fated to play a
| staring role in at least one conspiracy theory going forward.
| GhostVII wrote:
| There was pretty strong evidence she defrauded investors, lots
| of hard evidence of her making claims that we now know aren't
| true. I haven't heard much strong evidence that she
| intentionally defrauded patients though. I think it is totally
| possible that she lied to investors about Theranos's
| capabilities (ex. How many tests they could run), while still
| thinking that the tests they were running were accurate.
| dathinab wrote:
| > defrauding patients about their test results
|
| Because und test results where in general correctish, they
| where just not gotten in exactly the way it was claimed, which
| was also not noticable less reliable or anything.
|
| And what the user bought was the test result.
|
| As far as I understood, with my very limited understanding of
| US law it seems hard to sue as a consumer as you where deceived
| but not hurt/damaged in any way.
| schappim wrote:
| >> test results where in general correctish, they where just
| not gotten in exactly the way it was claimed, which was also
| not noticable less reliable or anything.
|
| Guess they just answered the question of "If you can't tell
| the difference, does it matter?".
| buzzdenver wrote:
| Wasn't Theranos' claim that they could do tests from much
| less blood? So how could the results be accurate if they
| presumably didn't have enough samples?
| cpitman wrote:
| They were often doing full blood draws, not finger pricks.
| azernik wrote:
| During the purported early use of their technology, they
| were also taking full-size blood draws for "validation"
| against existing machines, i.e. the results were actually
| from off-the-shelf full-sample-size machines.
| xdennis wrote:
| > test results where in general correctish
|
| They diluted the blood. They couldn't possibly be correct.
| dathinab wrote:
| I might also have gotten the wrong information.
|
| The maybe not right information I got was:
|
| During the trial phase they get full sized blood samples +
| finger prick to do cross validation.
|
| The results they send back where "from the validation" as
| it was basically the only test done.
| ClumsyPilot wrote:
| "test results where in general correctish"
|
| "we gave you treatmemt for wrong type of cancer, close
| enought!"
| rossdavidh wrote:
| If Theranos still existed as a company, some of their results
| were bogus enough that they probably could get sued (IANAL).
| But Theranos doesn't exist any more.
| danjac wrote:
| It's a bit like Al Capone being done for tax evasion rather
| than murder - you convict them on the charges that have the
| most evidence and are likely to stand up in court, even if they
| are lesser charges from a criminal and moral standpoint.
| jlduan wrote:
| > It blows my mind that she was found guilty for defrauding
| investors, but not guilty for defrauding patients about their
| test results.
|
| Not excusing it. But maybe the jurors think the doctors and/or
| insurance companies ordered/interpreted these tests have some
| responsibilities too?
| colechristensen wrote:
| Eh, what seems easiest to prove gets prosecuted. Like mob
| bosses getting convicted of tax evasion.
|
| The lies to patients and investors were quite well linked
| anyway, if you want to think about it like that.
| hef19898 wrote:
| Didn't they use real lab equipment to conduct real tests? In
| which case the results would be ok, it just wasn't the tech she
| promised. Quite a while I read something about the details, so.
| thallium205 wrote:
| They didn't run a traditional test all the time.
| mdoms wrote:
| My guess about the discrepancy is that the lies she told
| investors were more brazen and came directly from her own
| mouth. She told investors and journalists that Theranos was
| working on military contracts (no such contracts ever existed),
| and she straight up told investors that no third party testing
| was involved in Theranos test results (a lie). She directly
| ordered employees to omit positive test results from investors'
| blood tests because she didn't have confidence in the results.
| This is all documented and she has admitted to much of it.
|
| The lies told to patients and fraudulent test results could be
| (and were) denied by saying she wasn't aware of what was
| happening in the labs.
|
| It's not that investors are more important in the eyes of the
| law or that patients weren't lied to, it's about the quality of
| the evidence available. Her not guilty verdicts do not mean
| she's innocent, simply that there wasn't enough evidence
| available to convince a jury.
| dmix wrote:
| They farmed out the patient results to real machines pretending
| they were using Theranos. So they were technically real.
| lbriner wrote:
| As other posters have commented, since they were claiming
| results from much smaller samples, these "good" machines
| weren't given the amount of blood required for reliable
| results so this is also fraudulent and much worse imho
| because the people operating these machines must have know
| they were artifically amplifying samples.
| gigatexal wrote:
| I get that investors should know any investment can go to 0.
| But she was defrauding them by outright lying about how well
| the tech worked and what it could do. This verdict I think
| restores that contract between entrepreneurs and investors by
| saying if both invest in good faith then the whole thing works
| out. Otherwise we allow grifters like her and her business
| partner to suck good money out of the system. Now future folks
| who would try to do the same have this verdict to look at.
|
| Patients who were wronged by the company did get screwed
| though. Such is the nature of trials by jury sometimes the jury
| doesn't come through.
| TeeMassive wrote:
| Weren't they secretly testing blood samples with actual working
| machines?
| tcoff91 wrote:
| They misused the real machines. I highly recommend reading or
| listening to Bad Blood. Excellent book, I could hardly put it
| down.
| HWR_14 wrote:
| In some cases they were, in other cases they tried their
| machines. Even when they used the real machines, it's unclear
| if they had enough blood, skilled operators, time and
| maintenance to generate accurate results.
| trimbo wrote:
| Could this be because they were secretly doing the testing
| using traditional lab testing machines (as described in Bad
| Blood)? Maybe that made it hard to prove any specific test was
| tainted.
| gitfan86 wrote:
| Fraud means that you lied for personal gain. There is more
| evidence of her lying directly to investors than to patients.
| shultays wrote:
| > Investors know that every dollar they put into a company
| could disappear Is not it kinda different if you are being lied
| though? If Holmes were faking her accomplishments and you
| investments were depending on those then I don't see why this
| wouldn't be fraud
|
| If the patients were still getting correct results (I assume
| they were still being tested, but in traditional ways) then it
| makes sense that they were not being scammed
| nradov wrote:
| Those patients might have standing to file a civil class action
| suit against Holmes. Not sure if she has enough assets left to
| make that worthwhile.
| hellbannedguy wrote:
| 1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote:
| "But a patient does not expect for their blood test results to
| be completely wrong."
|
| The patient's state of mind, e.g., their expectations, is not
| an element of wire fraud. Only Holmes' state of mind is
| relevant; specifically, her intent.
| 1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote:
| "As a general rule, the crime is done when the scheme is
| hatched and an attendant mailing or interstate phone call or
| email has occurred. Thus, the statutes are said to condemn a
| scheme to defraud regardless of its success.34 It is not
| uncommon for the courts to declare that to demonstrate a
| scheme to defraud the government needs to show that the
| defendants communications were reasonably calculated to
| deceive persons of ordinary prudence and comprehension.35
| Even a casual reading, however, might suggest that the
| statutes also cover a scheme specifically designed to deceive
| a nave victim.36 Nevertheless, the courts have long
| acknowledged the possibility of a puffing defense, and there
| may be some question whether the statutes reach those schemes
| designed to deceive the gullible though they could not
| ensnare the reasonably prudent.37 In any event, the question
| may be more clearly presented in the context of the
| defendants intent and the materiality of the deception.38"
|
| https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/R41930.pdf
|
| "In any event, the question may be more clearly presented in
| the context of the defendant's intent and the materiality of
| the deception."
|
| Whether a patient expected that results might be inaccurate,
| or even whether a "reasonably prudent" person would have
| expected results might be inaccurate, is not necessarily a
| defence to wire fraud. Even if such a defence were asserted,
| the focus would still be on Holmes, her conduct and her
| intent, not the patient.
| jcranmer wrote:
| It's not particularly surprising, if you assume that the jury
| was essentially looking for a specific, traceable line between
| representations from Elizabeth Holmes herself (and nobody else)
| and the subsequent payment as a necessary element of fraud.
| (Whether or not the jury was doing so could be guessed from
| reading the jury instructions, which I haven't done).
|
| Being found guilty of defrauding investors in that light is
| easy because Holmes did specific acts, such as basically saying
| "we're endorsed by $BIG_PHARMA" knowing that they weren't, as
| part of her investor pitch--that's a pretty unambiguous
| traceable injury. But tracing anything she herself said to
| getting a random schmoe on the street to take a blood test...
| again, if you think fraud requires that specific act, it's not
| hard to see why someone would vote not guilty there.
|
| Of course, I would still have liked to see her proclaimed
| guilty on fraud for the test results. But as abhorrent as her
| actions may have been, they may not have necessarily climbed
| the bar into illegality.
| Pxtl wrote:
| From what I've read, patients were prevented from testifying
| about the impact of the damage caused by the incorrect test
| results. That means life-changing pain and suffering was
| concealed from the jury.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| Not true: here is one example of testimony:
|
| https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/17/theranos-patient-says-
| blood-...
| Pxtl wrote:
| Ah, thanks for the info. My mistake.
| michael1999 wrote:
| This diffusion of responsibility in corporations drives me
| crazy. A CEO can create a crimogenic environment, and as long
| as there are enough layers of management or outsourcers, you
| can't pin the specific crime on anyone, and you can't jail a
| corporation.
| gkoberger wrote:
| I agree with everything you said, but I think the person
| you're replying to is less upset at the prosecutors/jury, and
| more upset about the laws in the first place. They protect
| the rich and powerful, and don't worry about the average
| person getting hurt.
| saurik wrote:
| I maybe agree that that's what that comment probably should
| have been focussed on, but they did explicitly cal out the
| "prosecutors" for having "fucked up" getting the
| conviction.
| piaste wrote:
| In this case it seems to be a matter of distance, not
| power.
|
| Imagine that, rather than the CEO making shit up, the case
| was about a lowly lab technician who faked results out of
| laziness or recklessness. Even though his fraud ultimately
| impacted the patients, he would probably still get
| convicted for defrauding his boss or the company he
| directly worked for, not the patients he never met or knew.
| ivanhoe wrote:
| There's a difference, lab tech would impact individuals,
| but he wouldn't make false claims to the general public
| as the company's main selling point. Here we have someone
| basically selling snake oil to people, and still she was
| found guilt only for hurting her investors.
|
| Ultimately, does this mean that the next fraudster will
| get away with it as long as they keep their investors in
| the loop about the lies?
| pydry wrote:
| The Sacklers kind of got away with it. They're not going
| to prison for dealing drugs.
|
| The law really is weighted in favor of investors.
| codeflo wrote:
| Unfortunately, they'll get away with it as long as the
| company value goes up. As long as investors make money,
| who told whom what is irrelevant.
| throwawaylinux wrote:
| I think you have to look at the client side of the power
| equation. Nobody in the government is going to stick
| their neck out because a few voiceless plebs may have got
| the wrong blood test results at Walmart.
|
| If your client was a wealthy person or large corporation
| and you knowingly lied to them about the performance of
| your product or service which caused them damages, would
| you get charged?
| 2-718-281-828 wrote:
| well distance to common people correlates at least in one
| direction with power ... so it is directly related.
| l33tman wrote:
| My layman's interpretation is that she willingly defrauded
| investors but did in fact deliver test results to the patients,
| albeit at a lower quality level than you would expect in the
| industry.
|
| I think in the HBO documentary they say the unravelling started
| because of FDA complaints on the bloodwork being sub par. But I
| think you can't jail someone for 120 years because they did a
| shoddy product. Maybe the prosecutors simply went for the
| biggest bang for their buck?
| thallium205 wrote:
| Prosecution went for both, but the jury only agreed with the
| fraud.
| jen20 wrote:
| I've been reading Dorothy Atkins' live tweet coverage of the
| trial since day 1, and it gives a blow by blow account of it.
| It starts at [1], and runs all the way up until the verdict.
| Strongly recommended.
|
| [1]: https://twitter.com/doratki/status/1435590320897478657
| unkulunkulu wrote:
| Great source! Thank you!
|
| For those stuck at the end of first day coverage the way I
| found is: type <<from:doratki day 2>> in search
| unkulunkulu wrote:
| For day 2 in particular you want the sep 14 tweet, the nov
| one is day 2 of Holmes testimony
| kjaftaedi wrote:
| They had a fully functional lab though, it just wasn't using
| Theranos' devices.
|
| This is what they did to Wallgreens, they sold them on the idea
| that they would have theranos machines in-store, but instead
| what they did was do IV blood draws (calling it a comparison
| check) .. and then would just process the samples the same way
| as everyone else using standard equipment.
|
| People were getting good results because Theranos was using
| machines from Siemens in their hidden lab.
| jmcgough wrote:
| They were using traditional siemens for most tests but were
| doing some tests with a fingerprick that they diluted - like
| their PSA test sometimes coming back super high for cis
| women, indicating that they had prostate cancer.
| kjaftaedi wrote:
| Agreed, but the line of thinking is to try and prosecute
| this.
|
| You'd have to prove to the court that theranos used their
| bad techniques instead of their good ones.
|
| I am not as optimistic they kept such detailed records of
| their crimes, and feel this would be a tough angle to
| successfully prosecute.
| Flammy wrote:
| My understanding is they took much smaller samples of blood
| which lead to lots of reproducibility problems. The standard
| machines they were using were being fed with up-sampled blood
| because Theranos didn't have the normal sample size.
|
| > People were getting good results because Theranos was using
| machines from Siemens in their hidden lab.
|
| Thus the tests sometimes were good, and sometimes bad. Some
| patients underwent unnecessary medical treatments and
| procedures based on bad tests.
| justinator wrote:
| I believe they also reverse engineered a lot of the third
| party machines, in an attempt to make them work the way they
| wanted to. That's... that's bad.
| protastus wrote:
| Emphasis on attempt.
|
| After failing to produce their own reagents and hardware,
| Theranos pivoted to using off-the-shelf Siemens hardware
| and reagents (purchased through a shell company) and
| dramatically diluting the blood samples to make good on the
| "single drop of blood" customer promise.
|
| This would've been an impressive feat of reverse
| engineering, software eating the world, IF IT WORKED. But
| it didn't. Results couldn't even pass internal audits and
| the FDA forced Theranos to invalidate ~1 million test
| results when they found what was going on.
| kragen wrote:
| Reverse engineering is an important right that is protected
| by centuries of patent and trade secret law in the US and
| many other countries. It's fundamental to innovation, even
| though non-innovative bad people like Theranos also do it.
|
| Reverse engineering is not bad, and it is dismaying that
| someone posting on a site called "Hacker News" would think
| so.
| justinator wrote:
| _Reverse engineering is not bad, and it is dismaying that
| someone posting on a site called "Hacker News" would
| think so. _
|
| Personal attacks aside,
|
| I'm just saying that if I get a blood test and it says
| I've got AIDS and I actually don't -
|
| and that's all because some sociopath grifter with less
| of an education than what's been proven with my own
| Bachelors of Fine Arts realized that to swindle millions
| of _more_ dollars from her geriatric backers she 's been
| manipulating (and ruining the lives of their own family
| members),
|
| she needs to fake the test results from an impossible
| dream machine that does NOT exist and couldn't ever -
| because it defies the laws of physics,
|
| and does this by running modified machines of her
| competitors that are now basically broken,
|
| in secret rooms she doesn't tell journalists or
| inspectors about,
|
| well: that's truly _fucked_.
| WillPostForFood wrote:
| Yes! And reverse engineering is not bad. Everything else
| you mention is bad.
| justinator wrote:
| I do think there's nuance when the product is a medical
| testing device, and the company doing the reverse
| engineering is a competitor of the company who made said
| device and that engineering was faulty and could have
| cost people's lives.
|
| But I don't know if the context of any of this is what
| some really want to discuss. It's just the slogans. You
| know: "hack the planet" and all.
|
| I also don't think I'd be really OK with working for a
| company that told me to do this reverse engineering, but
| if your morality says differently, then: hey.
| kragen wrote:
| I don't think you should be criticizing reverse
| engineering here any more than you should be criticizing
| programming, science, skill, studying, engineering,
| logic, thought, changing your mind when you're wrong, or
| any of the other basic aspects of hacking. You're as out
| of place here as someone complaining about how nerds
| study all the time, get better grades than you do, and
| know how to fix their computers while you're stuck paying
| someone else to do it. You come off as a troll posting
| deliberate flamebait in hopes of getting a rise out of
| us.
|
| Of course _badly done_ reverse engineering can be bad.
| But that 's not because it's reverse engineering; it's
| because it reaches incorrect conclusions that hurt
| people, just like not doing any reverse engineering at
| all. The problem that put people at risk in this case
| wasn't that Theranos did reverse engineering; it's that
| they didn't do _enough_ reverse engineering.
| Simon_O_Rourke wrote:
| Well said, a shameless grifter needlessly put people at
| immense risk because ego is a thing, and showed craven
| desire for money and celebrity.
| kragen wrote:
| Agreed. My criticism is that these problems should not be
| blamed on reverse engineering any more than they should
| be blamed on histology.
| rleigh wrote:
| Their use of the term "reverse engineering" is perhaps
| not ideal.
|
| If they were taking apart and studying the hardware
| inside competitors' machines, then that would not have
| been a problem. It's something which many companies do.
| But they would not be using this for patient testing,
| they would use it as input to product development and
| engineering.
|
| Theranos were modifying the machines to operate outside
| their design parameters. Medical diagnostic equipment is
| validated at great expense to operate within given
| parameters to give a diagnostic result which is known to
| be accurate with a very high probability. They are
| carefully calibrated and tested to guarantee the accuracy
| of every test. Tampering with them makes them invalidated
| and destroys any guarantee of diagnostic result accuracy.
| The FDA approval for the equipment is only valid if they
| are operated as intended.
| kragen wrote:
| Agreed. My concern is precisely with this conflation of
| Theranos's negligent misconduct with the exercise of the
| fundamental rights which allow us to fix our cars (if you
| fix your car without a shop manual, you're doing reverse
| engineering --- and both Chilton and Haynes do reverse
| engineering to write their shop manuals), fix our laptops
| (see Louis Rossmann), uncover Microsoft's dirty tricks to
| break competitors' software (reverse-engineering was
| crucial to the antitrust trial), preserve our information
| (both PDF and Word formats were reverse engineered before
| they were opened), use IBM-compatible PCs (the clone
| industry was able to launch because Phoenix reverse
| engineered the BIOS and wrote a cleanroom clone), and
| generally do anything with a manufactured device that the
| manufacturer didn't intend.
|
| For this reason there are carve-outs in copyright law
| where something is illegal _except_ when done for the
| purpose of reverse engineering; for example, in the US,
| you have _Sega v. Accolade_.
| topaz0 wrote:
| I think "reverse engineering" in the gp was just an ill-
| considered choice of word. What they are describing
| doesn't really have anything to do with reverse
| engineering -- it's just using the devices in a way that
| will not produce the desired reliability of results. The
| fact that their methods differed from what the
| manufacturer recommends would not be a problem if they
| could prove that the false positive/false negative rates
| were up to the relevant standards.
| darkerside wrote:
| Reverse engineering for shits and giggles, good. Reverse
| engineering for profit by modifying a device regulated by
| the FDA, bad.
| lai-yin wrote:
| I think you mean, reverse engineering to create new,
| better machines: good. Reverse engineering to game a
| medical testing device: bad.
| keypusher wrote:
| But not illegal, except under very specific circumstances.
| ghshephard wrote:
| I think that's entirely fine - both for patients and
| investors (Siemens might be a bit Irate, but I don't know
| if I would put that in the "Bad" category). The issue would
| be if they informed their investors that tests were being
| done on Theranos technology, but were actually using
| siemens technology. With regards to the patients - all they
| should care about is accuracy of test results - whether
| Theranos was doing it with Theranos tech, Siemens Tech,
| Reverse Engineered Siemens Tech + dilution of the blood to
| get enough volume is mostly irrelevant to a patient - they
| just want to get the highest quality information possible,
| regardless of the route taken.
| jmcgough wrote:
| > Reverse Engineered Siemens Tech + dilution of the blood
| to get enough volume is mostly irrelevant to a patient
|
| Those machines weren't designed to work that way though,
| so the test results were wildly inaccurate when they did
| dilutions. And they fired people who wanted to delay
| rollout in order to ensure that they had consistently
| accurate results.
| ghshephard wrote:
| The point I was making was that it was irrelevant how the
| original designs were intended - if Theranos had been
| able to successfully reverse engineers the tests, and
| determine a way to make them work reliably, while it
| would have made those of us who believed Theranos had
| some incredible new technology, and that Elizabeth Holmes
| was the next coming, no patients need to have been
| concerned. It was the fact that the tests _were_
| unreliable, that made Theranos guilty.
|
| Lying about it to the Investors, and possible
| intellectual/contract issues with Siemens are another
| issue.
| josefx wrote:
| > It was the fact that the tests were unreliable, that
| made Theranos guilty.
|
| Very few tests are 100% reliable, so I would expect that
| Theranos claims about how the tests where performed would
| play a significant role in determining the guilt. People
| where told they would get the perfect magic pixy dust
| test that worked on one drop of blood instead they got
| one of the early covid tests that needed at least four
| repeats to give a "most likely negative" result,
| unsurprisingly the covid tests also resulted in confused
| tweets by the one or other VC.
| ghshephard wrote:
| Well - some of the tests _have_ to be 100% reliable,
| because medication decisions are made on them, and the
| incorrect dosage can be harmful. It 's not like a cheap
| $10 antigen tests that has sub 100% specificity and
| sensitivity - a bunch of the tests were trying to measure
| particular levels. Theranos was just overall horrible.
| They were trying to do some tests that were impossible
| based on the physics of what can be measured by pinprick
| blood.
| jmcgough wrote:
| Yeah, I think we're actually in agreement here. Sometimes
| I think about how, if Theranos had figured out how to
| make things work over the last year before the WSJ
| article, all of their horrible and unethical practices
| would have been swept under the rug even if they were
| essentially lying for years to investors and patients.
|
| Unfortunately, it turns out that "fake it til you make
| it" doesn't work with some problems that are seemingly
| unsolvable (at least by the approach they took).
| [deleted]
| abosley wrote:
| Go research wire fraud.
| kingkawn wrote:
| If protection of patient health was a critical component of the
| US healthcare system we would have a public option. We don't,
| so we don't. The only thing that is protected in the US is
| money.
| paxys wrote:
| Guilty of taking a billion+ dollars from rich and influential
| people who couldn't bother to do the bare minimum due diligence
| into their investments due to greed and FOMO.
|
| Not guilty of endangering thousands of lives by running
| fraudulent and inaccurate tests under sub-par lab conditions.
|
| Our justice system is such a farce.
| nemo44x wrote:
| Our justice system works well. You are confusing your own
| emotional feelings for what you would have liked to see with
| the reality of what was able to be proven without reasonable
| doubt. The type of populist mob justice you allude* to is not
| just at all.
|
| *(Fixed grammar error specified below)
| syki wrote:
| Your comments in regard to this case are right but our
| justice system does not work well. People who can afford
| lawyers do much better than those who can't.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| Unless someone is "alluding" to a lynching then "populist mob
| justice" is a gross mischaracterization of laypeople
| expressing disdain for the justice system.
| lukewrites wrote:
| Eluded so completely from the comment that it didn't appear
| at all.
| r0p3 wrote:
| "allude" is to imply while "elude" is the evade
| philosopher1234 wrote:
| If "proven beyond a reasonable doubt" keeps leading to bad
| outcomes, maybe that's not the right standard.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| That is a dangerous precedent to remove. Certainly we don't
| want to replace judges and juries with Twitter polls.
| philosopher1234 wrote:
| Sure, but if the precedent isn't generating justice, then
| it's worth considering alternatives. There is no holy
| scripture which says proof beyond a reasonable doubt is
| the correct way to run a justice system.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| If you can't prove they are guilty, how do you know it
| isn't generating justice?
|
| If not here where would you rather draw the line?
| Incarcerate 1 more innocents s that 1 more guilty makes
| it into jail?
|
| We could have a more likely than not standard of 51%
| chance like civil law, and 49% of inmates are innocent.
|
| Would you personally really want to send someone to
| prison if you had reasonable doubts of their guilt?
| [deleted]
| pcbro141 wrote:
| Our justice system is terrible. Look at the huge racist
| disparities like 5-10x rate of incarceration of Black people
| for weed, even though Whites use weed at similar rates. Then
| the for profit prisons, ridiculously high sentences,
| appalling prison conditions, and mass incarceration of 21% of
| the world's prison population.
| nemo44x wrote:
| No one goes to prison for using weed. You go to prison for
| trafficking it.
|
| Our prison population reflects our crime rate demographics.
| Certain demographics commit far more crime, especially
| violent crime, than other demographics. They are
| represented accordingly in our prisons.
|
| Justice is pretty fair and blind across the board. Do the
| crime then do the time.
| [deleted]
| dehrmann wrote:
| As another comment said, patients' tests were apparently run on
| regular machines, so the patients weren't harmed.
| paxys wrote:
| The FDA voided over a million tests performed by Theranos due
| to unsanitary lab conditions, contaminated samples and
| unauthorized modifications of testing machines. Their results
| were anything but accurate.
| sangnoir wrote:
| They also were using samples much smaller than demanded by
| the specs on the regular machines resulting in inaccurate
| results.
| tschwimmer wrote:
| This is trivially false. From the linked article:
|
| "When Theranos' machines were rolled out to Walgreens stores
| in California and Arizona, they gave patients false or flawed
| results. One patient testified that she was led to believe
| she was having a miscarriage after taking a Theranos test,
| when indeed her pregnancy was viable. Another patient thought
| her cancer had returned when it had not, following a test.
| But in the end, jurors did not believe that Holmes
| intentionally deceived patients."
|
| These examples by themselves are clear instances of harm.
| However, it's not unlikely that more patients were affected
| and perhaps even some of them took actions that were harmful
| to their health based on this false data.
| kawera wrote:
| Collected blood samples were too small for accurate results
| using regular machines.
| wombatmobile wrote:
| > Holmes was the poster child of Silicone Valley hubris
|
| Holmes was convicted of fraud, which is a crime.
|
| If hubris was a crime, the meek would inherit the earth, and
| Silicone Valley real estate would be affordable.
| cmckn wrote:
| It's Silicon.
| celticninja wrote:
| I prefer SillyCon
| MarkMc wrote:
| Silicone Valley is in LA ;)
| [deleted]
| holografix wrote:
| Let's not confuse arrogance with strength. Plenty of royalty
| lost their heads based on that assumption.
| Siira wrote:
| And I'm sure an order of magnitude more didn't lose their
| head based on that assumption.
| [deleted]
| chaxor wrote:
| It's interesting that it took so long for this to finally be
| resolved, such that now - the technological goals that they had
| may actually be surmountable soon. I wonder what Theranos 2.0
| will be called when it cross up in a few years. FBhealth ?
| BioBezosBot ? AppleSeq ? GoogleBlood ? NetStix ?
| usrusr wrote:
| If they can really pull it off, "Lizzy H".
|
| If you can do something that previously was strictly in the
| realm of magic, name your company after a famous magician.
| dav_Oz wrote:
| For somebody unfamiliar on how start-ups on that scale "work", I
| suppose this edge case offers some valuable insight.
|
| I more often than not had a hard time understanding what some
| well funded start-ups I had contact with are actually up to. From
| personal accounts of the people involved, the common modus
| operandi seemed to be "let the money stream not ebb and we will
| figure something out in the meanwhile" as supposed to "you
| finally do not have to be preoccupied about the finances and can
| start focusing on solving the problems at hand".
|
| I wonder how efficient the system really is, purely in enabling
| indivduals to develop their ideas into some form of actualization
| and even if the "start-up" fails completely on its promise. And
| also how much room to appreciate the efforts made so one can at
| least activley learn from mistakes/misconceptions made.
|
| Elon Musk is an interesting example as it illustrates that there
| seems to be a goldilock zone of over the top "predictions", a
| hypnotic dance with investors and the public: "How long for X
| taking place?" Aside from his PR, at least he delivers on some
| actualized forms of engineering feats.
|
| As the pendulum swings from government funding to private
| funding, the high concentration of wealth ("resources to enable")
| on either side make it prone to that scale of fraud.
| qwerty456127 wrote:
| Although I acknowledge the fact of her wrongdoing and that such
| has to be prosecuted so others would "think twice" before
| committing a fraud (healthcare-related fraud especially) I, to be
| sincere, understandably feel zero real anger to her - because the
| whole thing happened rather far away and didn't affect anybody I
| know.
|
| At the same time I feel genuinely curious about her thoughts and
| emotions as she unarguably is a formidable lady - scamming so
| many supposedly smart and competent people obviously requires
| outstanding logical and emotional intelligence (note emotional
| intelligence doesn't necessarily imply being good, it means being
| good at observing, understanding and managing emotions of
| yourself and others, whatever a purpose, good or evil),
| understanding of the market, society and people.
|
| This makes me sad she herself never wrote a book and if and when
| she will (perhaps she'll have time for that in the prison) she is
| hardly going to write anything but "I'm so sorry" bullshit.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| Hard sciences are hard. We have it easy in software.
|
| That's why her "lesson" from SV entrepeneurs about "fake it til
| you make it" did not apply. They weren't doing medicine.
|
| Revolutionizing an industry where there are already standards,
| laws, people's health at stake, and government bureaucracies is
| WAY harder than what most of her heroes did.
| rTX5CMRXIfFG wrote:
| These days, whenever someone is being presented as an absolute
| villain (as in the case of Holmes), comments sections tend to
| have not a few posts about how the things they've done, from a
| different vantage point, are understandable, or morally ambiguous
| and not objectively evil, or even amoral. I'm completely opposed
| to what she has done, but could there be any reason why we all
| seem to be unanimous that she is objectively evil?
| rurp wrote:
| I really don't think there's much of a "there" there. In
| addition to the points others have made, she wouldn't have even
| gotten off the ground with this if she'd been a nobody from a
| poor family. Leveraging her family's connections was an
| essential part of the process and makes the whole thing even
| more shady.
| tootie wrote:
| Her main excuse is that she was manipulated by her COO but it
| seems unlikely. As evil as defrauding investors can be she was
| it. She also seemed pretty comfortable scamming medical techs
| and patients. There's just no way she didn't know she was
| selling snake oil. Maybe she started out with pure wishful
| thinking that if she talked enough she could will her device
| into existence but once it started actually testing blood it
| was way past the line. She was the CEO, she knew it was fake
| technology, she lied at every opportunity.
| iscrewyou wrote:
| Exactly. Anybody can be making a company and say they haven't
| done it yet but are making progress.
|
| She said it works and that was a lie. A lie that affect lives
| and economics of rich and poor alike. Bad combination.
| jjulius wrote:
| While the case against her was about defrauding investors, a
| strong case could also be made that, for the sake of her own
| wealth, fame, and success (she notably wanted to be "the next
| Steve Jobs"), she defrauded anybody looking for medical
| assistance.
|
| Fucking around with people's health just to get rich and famous
| is evil.
| globular-toast wrote:
| I think it's because of the weird eyes and deep voice.
| Honestly. There is something deeply unsettling about her. If
| she didn't do the wide eye and deep voice thing she'd be very
| attractive and people would think differently. They'd probably
| defend her saying she was manipulated and trusted the wrong
| people etc.
| Jensson wrote:
| I don't see many call murderers or other serious criminals
| understandable. Holmes is a serious criminal, why would you
| expect to find people defending her? I haven't seen anyone
| defend Jeffrey Skilling either.
| acdanger wrote:
| Yes
| dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
| The evidence.
|
| I don't think it's any sort of prejudice (sexism, high flyer,
| etc), her behaviour seems to speak for itself.
| selfhifive wrote:
| Because she messed with the financial life and physical life of
| people. Also she used the enthusiasm shared by people who like
| to advance technology to manipulate people which is a grave sin
| for the kind of audience you'll find here.
| smm11 wrote:
| Zero sympathy from me. I hope she burns.
|
| Far, far too many of these charlatans out there. I used to admire
| many, thinking I wasn't working hard enough, trying enough, so I
| busted my rear for decades, career-wise and activity-wise.
|
| They're all bluffing. Lying. Stealing. Cheating. Eff them all.
| ineedasername wrote:
| Ironic that her board of directors-- one of the most praised
| aspects of Theranos-- probably hurt her when it came to going
| after her with criminal charges. These were some of the most
| well-connected people in the country, and making them look like
| fools did her no favors. Once it was clear this wouldn't go away
| quietly, I'd bet they pushed hard to ensure criminal prosecution.
| (which I think she deserved anyway.)
|
| Especially because it was those same directors' reputations that
| likely helped the fraud go on so long. There was probably a fair
| number of skeptics who thought _" Surely they wouldn't put their
| name on something like this if there was nothing there"_. I doubt
| Kissinger or the people around him want the last of his legacy to
| be punctuated by Theranos.
|
| I'll be honest: I kind of thought the same thing. That a
| breakthrough in science of this magnitude with so much silence
| around its details was strange, especially in the face of some
| expert skepticism. But the idea that Henry Kissinger etc. would
| attach themselves to it without compelling evidence made me more
| or less shrug my shoulders and move on.
| tristor wrote:
| > Henry Kissinger etc. would attach themselves to it without
| compelling evidence
|
| An endorsement from Henry Kissinger is hardly an endorsement.
| There were far more prominent and well-regarded VCs attached to
| Theranos to support your point, however, which I think is well-
| founded.
| leroy_masochist wrote:
| > Once it was clear this wouldn't go away quietly, I'd bet they
| pushed hard to ensure criminal prosecution.
|
| You're saying that Mattis, Cohen, etc had the ability to
| influence decisions within Trump's DoJ and exerted that ability
| in order to ensure that charges were filed against Holmes in
| 2018? If so, why do you think this?
| kesselvon wrote:
| You don't even have to influence. DoJ is naturally going to
| take interest when a huge startup that has the _Secretary of
| Defense_ on the board goes belly up.
| leroy_masochist wrote:
| Mattis left the Theranos board when he became SecDef and as
| such was not a board member when charges were filed in
| 2018.
| ineedasername wrote:
| I think you can change "has" to "had the current" in that
| comment and it still makes a reasonable point.
|
| I was in a job once where there was a snafu with a
| relative of a local politician. It didn't take a call
| from the politician for the CEO to issue an all-hands
| with a mandate to find out what the heck happened.
| leroy_masochist wrote:
| I don't think it is a reasonable point to claim without
| evidence that, as sitting SecDef, Mattis worked behind
| the scenes to get charges filed against Holmes in order
| to protect his reputation.
| ineedasername wrote:
| I did not make that claim. I speculated that government
| connections & influence by some of the board members may
| have played a part in how aggressively prosecution was
| pursued.
|
| Can I ask a question though? It seems we simply disagree
| here on what is reasonable speculation on the issue, and
| that's okay, but can I ask why you are focused on Mattis
| in this? He strikes me as a man of some integrity, and so
| I highly doubt he would have done anything inappropriate
| here. Though that very integrity might make him want to
| get to the bottom of things and therefore make inquiries
| about how seriously the issue was being handled by the
| DOJ-- again not in any inappropriate way. Out of the
| group of directors, I'd think him the least likely to
| have used his influence to _pressure_ anyone. And there
| 's a big difference between using _influence_ and using
| _pressure_.
|
| Also in my other comments I mention that it may even only
| have been passive influence: Having people of that high
| of a profile attached to a scandal can be enough to have
| folks at the DOJ and regional prosecutor's office take
| notice to see what's going on. In which case, to my
| original point, Holmes' high-profile board of directors
| worked against her when it came to criminal prosecution.
|
| Further, I admit 1) I should have been clearer in my
| original comment that such passive influence may have
| been the factor and 2) I was speculating, not making
| accusations of _inappropriate_ activity. I thought that
| was clear, but I suppose I 'm wrong.
|
| Maybe we should simply part ways on this thread in
| disagreement now, rather than continue what doesn't seem
| a productive conversation on this topic with each other.
| selestify wrote:
| Did the politician actually ever check in with the
| company about whatever happened?
| ineedasername wrote:
| Nope: that much I remember. It was over a decade ago & I
| was only peripherally involved so the details are hazy,
| but IIRC it was pretty much just the name-drop by the
| nephew (I think it was a nephew) that got the ball
| rolling, and we took the initiative from there. I'm
| pretty sure _we_ reached out to the politician 's office
| to "clear things up".
| ineedasername wrote:
| _If so, why do you think this?_
|
| Is it not clear that I'm speculating? And is speculating that
| people with government connections might use them in this
| situation? After all, that's part of why they were on the
| board in the first place. Did they _actually_ use that
| influence? I don 't know. But I think it's a reasonable bit
| of speculation. Influential people using their influence when
| they're publicly embarrassed shouldn't require much of an
| imagination.
|
| I'm not sure that Trump's presidency is relevant here. The
| influence these people have would be with others in the
| government, not Trump.
| leroy_masochist wrote:
| Got it, so your argument is basically an abstract appeal to
| cynicism.
|
| Not sure why you'd think it's "a reasonable bit of
| speculation" to baselessly posit that Mattis decided to
| obstruct justice by reaching out to a regional prosecutor
| in order to influence the government's decision to
| prosecute a criminal case.
| ineedasername wrote:
| Got it, so you're argument is basically that any
| speculation on an issue is unreasonable. I'm sure you
| never speculate on anything.
|
| It's also not obstruction of justice to ask the DOJ to
| look into an issue. If a _threat_ was involved in that
| request then sure-- that 's obstruction.
| leroy_masochist wrote:
| > you're argument is basically that any speculation on an
| issue is unreasonable. I'm sure you never speculate on
| anything
|
| I try not to make nonsensical conjectures in public
| forums, if that is the question you're asking.
| ineedasername wrote:
| I don't think it's nonsense the think it's _possible_ ,
| and not too implausible, that influential people placed
| on a Board due to their influence may actually have used
| that influence, or that their influence played a passive
| part in this. (see my other response on that.)
|
| Let's part ways on this topic though: You seem to be
| verging close to personal attacks, and so we've passed
| the point of useful discussion.
| MiscIdeaMaker99 wrote:
| Because it sounds like a much better story than what probably
| really happened.
| ineedasername wrote:
| Could be! Because regardless of outside influence, this is
| the sort of high-profile case that can boost the career of
| anyone working on prosecution.
|
| But I also don't think it's unrealistic or unreasonable to
| speculate that people who were on the board of directors
| due to their connections and influence could have used that
| same influence when things went sour.
| darksaints wrote:
| > I doubt Kissinger or the people around him want the last of
| his legacy to be punctuated by Theranos.
|
| I doubt the world's most notorious unprosecuted war criminal
| would have his reputation tarnished by advising a fraudster.
| ineedasername wrote:
| Believe it or not, there are plenty of people who think well
| of him. I don't happen to be one of them, but not everyone
| views his actions through the same lens. Also his de-
| escalation of tensions with the Soviet Union overshadows a
| lot of the other stuff for many people. He was a horrifically
| adept player of the realpolitik game, and for some people the
| awful acts that came with that game are just the necessary
| costs.
| pasabagi wrote:
| A lot of historians seem to see Kissinger as more the guy
| who thought of himself as 'horrifically adept', than the
| guy who actually was.
| ineedasername wrote:
| Separate from my other response, he is probably not a villain
| in his own mind. So, while Theranos wouldn't even register
| against some of his other acts from the opinions of many, it
| very well might in his own mind.
|
| I also should have been clearer in my original comment and
| provided another aspect of the influence people at that level
| have: It can often be passive. It may not take a phone call
| to for the influence to manifest itself: The mere involvement
| of prominent people like this in a scandal could be all it
| takes to spark significant interest by the DOJ and
| prosecutors to investigate, it doesn't necessarily have to be
| a back-channel request from the person to look into an issue.
| On a _much_ smaller scale that has happened where I work
| before.
| SauciestGNU wrote:
| His legacy is millions murdered directly through his actions.
| Theranos isn't enough to put a scratch in the veneer of his
| mass murderous legacy.
| baby wrote:
| Reminds me of magic leap. What happened to itv
| minitoar wrote:
| Magic Leap still exists. I think they pivoted a bit?
| deepsun wrote:
| Tim Draper was telling everyone that Holmes did no wrong.
|
| Last time I checked, a large poster with Elisabet Holmes was
| still present at the back of Hero City (Draper's accelerator,
| across the street from Draper University).
| luckydata wrote:
| Tim must be the single human being holding the most incorrect
| opinions on the face of the planet. I've never heard him
| being right about anything, it's kind of amazing really.
| ineedasername wrote:
| His "University" is somewhat questionable as well. It was
| very much _not_ a university when founded and only achieved
| legitimacy by proxy when ASU took them under its wing. And
| ASU seems to have dropped any reference to the ridiculous
| "Hero" pretentions in its marketing of the program-- I
| don't see any reference to it from ASU since 2018.
|
| It also doesn't appear to have produced many notable alumni
| in its (nearly) decade of existence: Some of the Alumni
| they feature are profiles of people with defunct products.
| The QTUM crypto currency may be an exception as a somewhat
| moderately successful coin w/ market cap ~$1B, although
| that's not quite the same as a Unicorn valuation since it
| doesn't really all belong to QTUM as an organization.
|
| It's possible I'm not being fair on the Alumni though: It
| does seem that fair number have gone on to modest success,
| and as I reflect on the above, the SV focus on
| multi-$billion valuations is possibly coloring my judgment.
| ASU-Draper doesn't necessarily have to be a Unicorn factory
| to be successful, so I'll temper my above judgement with
| that.
| ineedasername wrote:
| Tim Draper is one person. It's the non SV/VC members that
| would be a factor here. Of course I could be wrong: There's
| enough to Theranos to make the career of any prosecutor
| involved, and that may have been enough. But speculating on
| that as the animus doesn't seem any more or less unreasonable
| than speculating that people who were on the board for their
| government influence might have been a factor. They may never
| even have needed to make a call: Having the names of two
| former Secretaries of State, a former Secretary of Defense,
| and a 4-star general attached to a scandal would be more than
| enough passive influence for people in the DOJ to perk up
| their ears and start looking to see what the heck happened.
| 1cvmask wrote:
| Kissinger is known for his war crimes and Nobel Peace Prize.
| Being associated with this fraud is not a stain on his
| reputation at all. They joined because they thought they were
| going to make a lot of money.
|
| Kissinger also has the fame of being the first Nobel Peace
| Prize recipient to bomb another Nobel Peace Prize recipient:
|
| https://www.huffpost.com/entry/doctors-without-borders-bombi...
|
| More on Kissinger war crimes:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Trial_of_Henry_Kissinger
| ineedasername wrote:
| Don't get me wrong, I'm not denying his brutal play of
| realpolitik game or any of his awful failures. (Also the
| Nobel Peace Prize has become pretty meaningless. I usually
| wonder what skeletons will come out of the closets of any
| recipients--Hitchens had some bad things to say about Mother
| Teressa too.)
|
| I'm talking about his name recognition, and most importantly
| his _influence & connections_. I'm sure he'd rather be
| remembered for his work with the Soviet Union & China.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| "Brutal play of realpolitik game" as if committing war
| crimes is some kind of tough-nailed, pragmatic style of
| leadership.
| ineedasername wrote:
| _tough-nailed, pragmatic style of leadership._
|
| That's a rough definition of realpolitik. Pragmatism over
| ideals or morals is baked into the concept.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| Yes, your praise has been noted.
| ineedasername wrote:
| I don't understand your comment. I didn't praise
| anything, I affirmed the definition of a word.
|
| Anything else you got from my comment came from your own
| reading (too much) into what I wrote.
| rc_mob wrote:
| I'm fairly sure that Hitler and some other really bad peoples
| have won a NPP. They didn't bomb any other winners?
| ineedasername wrote:
| If winning the prize is somewhat meaningless and awful
| people won the award then bombing a winner is not, by
| itself, a significant factor in judging the event. (well,
| not more significant than the fact of the bombing to begin
| with).
|
| Heck, if we're choosing awful moments in Peace Prize
| history, one winner bombing another winner isn't even
| unique.
| bg117 wrote:
| I remember my ex Manager who was from MIT taking the name of
| Theranos before it was in the news for all things bad and how
| they are revolutionizing healthcare. Looks like hype is how the
| whole thing is depending on.
| socrates1998 wrote:
| I am glad she was found guilty, but there are a few concerns.
| First, she was only convicted of lying to her investors, not the
| actual patients, which is laughable.
|
| Second, she is supposed to get up to 20 years for EACH of the
| counts (they will be served concurrently so she won't get 80
| years). And I am curious as to how much time she will actually
| serve.
|
| Third, what kind of sociopath has a baby in the middle of a trial
| where she could go to jail and not see the kid for years???
|
| Fourth, what kind of person meets her, googles her, thinks "it's
| all bullshit", then proceeds to get in a relationship with her
| AND have a kid with her. Man this woman is a con artist.
|
| She should get 20 years for the lies she spread and damage
| potentially did. Messing with people's blood tests for CANCER. So
| wrong.
| trutannus wrote:
| > what kind of sociopath has a baby in the middle of a trial
| where she could go to jail and not see the kid for years
|
| The same sort who would lie to cancer patients about their
| blood test results, and very probably lead a few to their
| deaths along the way? Sounds exactly like the Holmes we've all
| come to know.
| richardfey wrote:
| Is 'Theranos' still copyrighted / trademarked, or can it be
| freely used now?
| anshumankmr wrote:
| Who would want to use it?
| xdennis wrote:
| See: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29789279
| anshumankmr wrote:
| Memorabilia is different from using the brand name. Like I
| don't imagine we will be seeing a Theranos brand being
| slapped on medicines anytime soon (or at least that is what
| I thought the parent comment was asking about).
|
| That being said, I would hope the Theranos brand is sold
| and it assets liquidated to repay every person who had a
| fraudulent test result.
| luckystarr wrote:
| Crypto ransomnists perhaps?
| anshumankmr wrote:
| Crypto Ransomnists? What are those? Somebody who install
| malware and ask for crypto as ransom. Is that it?
| bigodbiel wrote:
| I am all for "fake it till you make it" specially with
| "sophisticated" private investors' capital. But what she, and her
| enablers, did with their clients' health was criminal.
| duxup wrote:
| What always amazed me is they had nothing... nothing that could
| do the thing they claimed. To the point they used competitors
| machines to produce results.
|
| Pretty amazing.
| thehappypm wrote:
| This is a vast oversimplification. They had machines. The
| machines did (sometimes) work for some tests. They were doing
| R&D to improve things. Rather than be honest Holmes decided to
| build a house of cards of lies.
| dvhh wrote:
| And a lot of people believed it. Pouring billions into
| something into empty promises.
| manquer wrote:
| While it is unusual for the med tech industry, isnt it what
| startups do all the time ? it is not that surprising to me .
|
| It is not pure SaaS companies either, in the EV/self-driving
| space we have outright frauds like Nikola rolled a truck
| downhill to make the video and were public at $8 Billion.
| Others like Rivian/ tuSimple are definitely are not going to
| meet the projections in sales and plans they have published.
| Tesla constantly says a lot of things they never delivery or
| deliver much _later_ than promised.
| lr4444lr wrote:
| The equivalent in SaaS would be something like saying you had
| a single non-distributed non-sharded table RDBMS technology
| that could perform equivalent at 10 billion records on full
| ACID as well as Postgres could on 100K records. You have no
| such thing. No one knows how to make such a thing. It would
| require a breakthrough in software at Turing award level. You
| should get slapped with charges if you take investor money
| claiming such a thing.
| [deleted]
| jollybean wrote:
| The magnitude of the lie isn't hugely relevant, a lie is a
| lie.
|
| Sales people lie all the time and make claims about
| features that don't exist, often because the company has
| other priorities not because they are 'impossible' - but
| again, that doesn't really matter either.
|
| It's a tactic used by salespeople to get the company to
| rally around a feature or set of features.
|
| It's very common.
|
| You have to ask yourself how that is not prosecuted as
| being illegal.
| duxup wrote:
| I think most of the start up proposals are more "here is what
| we do, where we're going to go and how".
|
| They may have nothing / not much yet... but you know that
| investing and generally their products are very "doable".
| Online focused cleaning service for example... it's a crud
| app, maybe they don't get users and fail, but the service was
| doable.
|
| Theranos claimed to already do the magic thing with blood
| (many tests with very little blood) that they simply could
| not do and never did.
|
| Big difference is Theranos lied about what the could do.
| Rando start up who is honest that they don't yet do the
| thing, no big deal.
|
| You can take money and have nothing... fail, but if you're
| honest it's not fraud.
| saberience wrote:
| At least Tesla actually delivered shit though and had actual
| real working electric cars. I don't think any investors are
| regretting investing in Tesla based on Elon's promises...
| colesantiago wrote:
| Do the 1 million robotaxis exist today as promised? I
| thought Elon said they due by the end of 2020? Can you tell
| me where they are?
| dboreham wrote:
| > isnt it what startups do all the time ?
|
| All the time? No.
| manquer wrote:
| Is this pedantic correction as in you would not comment had
| I said "most" of the time or do you mean to imply it is
| rare/uncommon/ unusual for startups to do so ?
| khazhoux wrote:
| Startups do NOT regularly re-package other companies'
| deliverables as their own, and especially not to cover
| for the fact that they've promised the impossible.
| globular-toast wrote:
| They did have something. They had marketing.
| ferdowsi wrote:
| I'm loving reading through all of the sickening puff pieces that
| business/tech journalists put out about her and Theranos.
|
| It's funny to think back to 2015 and the hagiographical void
| still left in tech journo hearts after Steve Jobs died.
|
| https://www.inc.com/ilan-mochari/elizabeth-holmes-theranos-i...
|
| > How Elizabeth Holmes Became America's New Entrepreneurial Icon
|
| > She represents the part of entrepreneurship that is long-term
| dedication, when nobody's watching
|
| >... That kind of walk-before-you-talk behavior is refreshing and
| respectable in today's hype-strewn entrepreneurial landscape.
| AtlasBarfed wrote:
| LOL, um, you are on a silicon valley startup site?
|
| The valuations of practically every company that comes out of
| here until it "goes public" is almost entirely based on this
| hype media infrastructure, or at least are dependent on
| somewhere between four and eight 0s in those company's
| valuations.
|
| This is a parable about sociopaths in society. They are
| tolerable as long as they are usable fools: useful for war,
| useful for flogging troops, play within certain rules. But
| there's a line, and you cross it, you risk revealing all the
| other vampire sociopaths that are controlling society.
|
| I have no sympathy for this postmodern uncanny valley AI-
| generated faildaughter CEO person-like matrix construct with
| empty, flaccid eyes. But she's a fascinating mirror into the
| CEO sausage factory.
| erosenbe0 wrote:
| Agree. And it was further shameful how the hype machine may
| have utilized her gender to try and portray her to young
| women and girls as a role model. When there are plenty of
| female CEO ushering in successful products like Dr. Lisa Su
| or whomever.
| pram wrote:
| "If you haven't yet heard of Elizabeth Holmes, you soon will."
|
| And how!
| tentacleuno wrote:
| > All of which is great fodder for flashy headlines.
|
| Yes... Something like that.
| clessg wrote:
| If you just stop reading right there, the article is
| perfectly cromulent!
| notyourwork wrote:
| TIL the word cromulent, cheers.
| cromulent wrote:
| Checking in.
| 1cvmask wrote:
| For those curious on cromulent:
|
| https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/what-does-
| crom...
| bb101 wrote:
| I do feel sorry for her in a way. She was riding a treadmill of
| expectations. Started off slowly, probably thinking "yeah, we
| can do this" and by the time the treadmill was moving at light
| speed, it was too late to get off.
|
| Even TED has removed her talk from YouTube. What responsibility
| do the media bear when their shallow hype turns out to be false
| and damaging to all parties?
| astura wrote:
| Please actually read the case files and evidence presented by
| the state, your characterization of her is incorrect. The
| jury's verdict confirms that.
| id02009 wrote:
| IIUC she'd fire anyone who'd challenge the hype or raise
| issues in the company. Not sure why you'd feel bad for her.
| WalterBright wrote:
| Her story arc is much like Bernie Madoff's. He, too, only
| really hurt wealthy investors. But did anyone feel bad for
| him?
| roelschroeven wrote:
| Only hurt wealthy investors? What about people who received
| incorrect testing results, like the woman who was given a
| false-positive HIV result and the woman who was incorrectly
| told that she was miscarrying?
|
| https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/09/theranos-
| results... https://arstechnica.com/tech-
| policy/2021/11/theranos-gave-wo...
| light_hue_1 wrote:
| > She was riding a treadmill of expectations. Started off
| slowly, probably thinking "yeah, we can do this" and by the
| time the treadmill was moving at light speed, it was too late
| to get off.
|
| She absolutely was not. It was completely obvious to anyone
| with any knowledge of the subject that what she was doing was
| fraudulent.
| some_random wrote:
| Nah you shouldn't feel bad for her, if you read into it she
| was constantly lying from the very beginning. As for media
| responsibility, I don't know how responsible they really are
| here for the actual fraud. While Holmes sent their stories of
| her to investors, she also had fake documents and other lies
| that made the bulk of her pitch (ie the military work).
| troyvit wrote:
| I feel bad for her too. She messed up, and probably did it
| intentionally too. That's messed up, but how much physical
| harm did people suffer? 60 years of prison time's worth? Near
| as I can tell a bunch of investors lost some money. Are they
| on the street now, begging for dinner? Kinda doubt it. Maybe
| there's a more fitting punishment.
| zazzyzuzz wrote:
| I think the harm was caused by using the investors and
| prestige of the company to build the consumer confidence
| into passing faulty testing on to patients and some
| patients testified to receiving pretty devastating false
| positives and results. Their customer service was directed
| to minimize their potential failure rates until one of the
| later lab directors voided a lot of the faulty test results
| after discovering how bad it actually was. While I believe
| she was mainly convicted of defrauding investors, it's not
| like her actions happened in a bubble. They operated for
| like 10 years like that.
| azth wrote:
| > but how much physical harm did people suffer
|
| Is physical harm the only harm that matters?
|
| > Are they on the street now, begging for dinner?
|
| That's not how justice works.
| [deleted]
| vkou wrote:
| It's pretty fitting, given how large the reward for pulling
| the fraud off was.
|
| There are, of course, a lot of people walking free who have
| done far worse things. (The Sacklers, for instance, should
| all be subject to a combination of prison and utter
| financial ruin. If the world were just, most of them should
| be living on the street, right now. Instead, they are
| making quaint arguments about how a third of their drug
| wealth is fair recompense, and how their plundered offshore
| billions should be protected from bankruptcy.)
| AlbertCory wrote:
| > riding a treadmill of expectations
|
| ... which she started up herself. Read about the Stanford
| prof who saw through her before she even started the Theranos
| journey.
| Wistar wrote:
| Stanford Prof. Phyllis Gardner
|
| Mercury News: "She saw through Elizabeth Holmes. Now
| Stanford professor is star in Theranos saga."
|
| https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/06/03/she-saw-through-
| eliza...
| autokad wrote:
| I think its wrong they removed her talk. It should be there,
| mistakes should be shown too.
| JohnJamesRambo wrote:
| Gell-Man Amnesia Effect in full effect. Will we remember when
| we read the next PR piece/pump and dump disguised as
| journalism?
| deepsun wrote:
| Well, some icons are half-lying/half-BSing/half-actually
| doing cool stuff. Will we remember their lies?
|
| PS: you know who I'm talking about, just don't want to invite
| fans here.
| potta_coffee wrote:
| I remember thinking that all the hype about her was somewhat
| over the top.
| ch4s3 wrote:
| I was going through a health tech startup incubator at the
| time, and it became a bit of a meme where we'd poke fun at
| anyone who bought into Theranos. Some went as far as
| putting together a slide deck to debunk the claims about
| running labs on such tiny volumes of blood. This was when
| and where I learned about the heterogeneity of blood.
| erosenbe0 wrote:
| It was an obvious farce. If they had real tech they could
| have simply done a million comparative tests on the
| military/VA or at free clinics and showed the relative
| accuracy.
| jondwillis wrote:
| you turn the page, and you forget.
| r00fus wrote:
| I will never forgive Bloomberg for their atrocious handling
| of Apple/Amazon/Supermicro "hacking" case where they didn't
| retract their claims despite no proof or evidence. I never
| cite that publication, it's toxic to me.
| WalterBright wrote:
| I got conned by pump and dump stock scam. The perpetrators
| got sentenced to 5 years. I was amazed to get a restitution
| check in the mail.
|
| I hope to be smarter next time.
| smarks wrote:
| Wow, that is amazing! What portion of your investment was
| returned? You don't have to say the actual amounts if you
| don't want, but I'm curious about whether you got 1/10,
| 1/2, or all of your investment back.
| WalterBright wrote:
| Actually, all of it! (It wasn't a large amount, though.)
| johnebgd wrote:
| No one in the media seems to still question if
| cryptocurrencies are serious investment assets despite little
| actual proven utility beyond being a speculative investment
| asset.
| caslon wrote:
| >Why Cryptocurrency Is A Giant Fraud
|
| >Speculators might make money on it, but the arguments for
| its usefulness fail completely.
|
| https://www.currentaffairs.org/2021/04/why-cryptocurrency-
| is...
|
| >Bitcoin is the greatest scam in history
|
| >It's a colossal pump-and-dump scheme, the likes of which
| the world has never seen.
|
| https://www.vox.com/2018/4/24/17275202/bitcoin-scam-
| cryptocu...
|
| >The Great Cryptocurrency Scam
|
| https://www.forbes.com/sites/jayadkisson/2018/11/20/the-
| grea...
|
| >Dogecoin Creator Says Crypto Is a Scam
|
| >Jackson Palmer went on Twitter for the first time in two
| years to remind us that the wealthy are ruining everything
| --even cryptocurrency.
|
| https://gizmodo.com/dogecoin-creator-says-crypto-is-a-
| scam-1...
| johnebgd wrote:
| Articles you cited are from years ago or a contributor
| (not an employee) of Forbes.
|
| I met Jackson Palmer in 2017/2018 and he had a level head
| for looking through this mania.
|
| Even the Tether fraud hasn't stopped the Bitcoin buying
| frenzy.
| caslon wrote:
| The first one was from under a year ago.
| brianobush wrote:
| > Even the Tether fraud hasn't stopped the Bitcoin buying
| frenzy.
|
| OT, but why would Tether impact Bitcoin? They are totally
| different use cases of crypto.
| ekanes wrote:
| I'd like to bet someone on this. If you or others are
| interested maybe we can refine a wager. :)
|
| I'm thinking that in 7 years there will be something built
| with blockchain tech (not cryptocurrency) that is used by
| 10M people?
|
| (I know you said cryptocurrencies but many people conflate
| the two and feel it's all bogus..)
| mkr-hn wrote:
| Anyone could win instantly by pointing out git. The hype
| is new, but not the concept.
| Cederfjard wrote:
| What definition do you have of blockchain tech that git
| fits into it?
| CRConrad wrote:
| Is git fueled by superfluous energy-wasting
| (=environment-destroying) "proof of work"?!?
| ilikepi wrote:
| There's a decent amount of bike-shedding over which
| workflow is the best, and that is a sort of inefficient
| "fuel" for git as a tool at some level...
| ted_dunning wrote:
| Hashing is not the same as blockchain.
| __coaxialcabal wrote:
| A hagiography (/,haegi'agr@fi/; from Ancient Greek agios,
| hagios 'holy', and -graphia, -graphia 'writing') or vita (from
| Latin vita, life, which begins the title of most medieval
| biographies) is a biography of a saint or an ecclesiastical
| leader, as well as by extension, an adulatory and idealized
| biography of a founder, saint, monk, nun or icon in any of the
| world's religions.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hagiography
| biztos wrote:
| > She only pauses in her work to run -- seven miles a day.
|
| -- Laura Arrillaga-Andreessen, yes _that_ Andreessen, writing
| in the New York Times Magazine about Visionary Tech
| Entrepreneurs with, um, no conflict of interest whatsoever I 'm
| sure.
|
| Turns out Palantir's Alex Karp was also "harnessing goodness
| through technology." No idea how she missed Adam Neumann.
|
| https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/10/12/t-magazine/el...
|
| [Edit: there is an implied conflict of interest in the spouse
| of a major venture capitalist hyping startups in a supposedly
| neutral publication, which is something I'm kind of surprised
| needs clarification, but there is also an explicit conflict of
| interest -- if we treat the author as a journalist anyway -- in
| that one of the five companies thus hyped in the linked article
| was an A16Z portfolio company. Sorry to anyone who thought I
| was implying that the Andreessens or A16Z were investors in
| Theranos, I assumed they were not and I didn't intend to imply
| that. Nor do I think it is in fact implied, but I obviously
| should have been clearer since people took it that way.]
| Grustaf wrote:
| A16z didn't invest in Theranos, did Marc personally invest or
| what is the conflict?
| biztos wrote:
| The article hypes five founders, one definitely was funded
| by A16Z, the others I think were not but I'm not sure.
|
| I don't know anything about the Andreessens' personal
| investments but just _as a general rule_ you might question
| the propriety of someone that close to the VC money using
| your storied newspaper to promote startup founders. I 'm
| not going to hold up the NYT as some bastion of
| journalistic ethics, but still.
|
| https://a16z.com/2011/07/24/meet-our-newest-portfolio-
| compan...
| Grustaf wrote:
| Hyping founders you _didn't_ invest in is sort of the
| opposite of nepotism though.
| biztos wrote:
| I disagree. It's a small VC world. I'm not going to
| assume the author was rooting for the failure of the
| other four operations. One of them even was interviewed
| on the A16Z podcast later (the one who tragically died).
| If you had a graph of all the people who contributed to
| Palantir's success and all the ones who have made money
| for A16Z, I bet you'd see a lot of overlap.
|
| Consider I have five artists in my collection, and I
| write an article about five artists but four of them are
| not in my collection. If I were to write about only the
| five in my collection, I might be called on it. By
| writing about the others I'm making it seem like the one
| in my collection just belongs in the group; and maybe the
| group will elevate my artist by association.
|
| I might actually like all five of the artists I write
| about! They might be true visionaries and altruists
| besides! They might paint all the time except when they
| are running!
|
| (Actually this kind of thing happens all the time in the
| art world, which makes my analogy a little depressing
| when I think about it...)
| Grustaf wrote:
| Sure, if you hype your own investment and add 4 more as
| decoy then you are hyping your own company, so that would
| be self serving.
| morelisp wrote:
| The Arrillaga family fortune goes up any time the value
| of "SV" as a brand (or concrete asset) goes up. It's a
| nice trick to not have a formal COI while still closely
| and actively managing your interests.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Arrillaga
| anthony_romeo wrote:
| I think you ought to actually explain the conflict of
| interest.
|
| I'm trying to find a clear connection between Theranos and
| Andreessen-related investments. I can't find evidence of an
| actual investment in Theranos.
|
| I'm not trying to dismiss you -- your theory[^1] could very
| well be totally right and there truly was a conflict [my
| duck-duck-go-ing skills only go so far]. And yeah, perhaps a
| person married to a wealthy tech investor ought not write
| high-profile articles possibly related to their partner's
| investments, and that publishers should be more wary of
| publishing such articles.
|
| Yet I do get frustrated seeing these sorts of vague cynical
| quips levying _specific_ accusations based more upon a gut
| plausibility of a scenario rather than a clear outline of
| information. It 's easy to throw bread crumbs into a forest
| and connect them to make a path, but that doesn't mean you've
| found a useful path.
|
| EDIT: Here is a somewhat-arbitrarily-selected article I found
| which discusses this topic:
| https://www.vox.com/2015/10/29/11620186/nyt-public-editor-
| bl...
|
| [^1]: _Technically_ you wrote that you were sure there was no
| conflict of interest whatsoever, but surely that was in jest.
| [deleted]
| bumby wrote:
| > _based more upon a gut plausibility of a scenario rather
| than a clear outline of information._
|
| What meets your threshold for a conflict of interest? Maybe
| I'm being too harsh, but this seems to meet my personal
| threshold.
|
| It's like if a politician heads a committee that has large
| sway in government contracts and they are close to someone
| who happens to invest in companies that bid on those
| contracts. It's easy to see a conflict exists even if a
| straight-line to a crime does not. Ethics often boils down
| to managing these conflicts so there isn't even a perceived
| avenue for impropriety. A politician breaches ethical
| boundaries irrespective if there's unequivocal evidence
| they let the relationship impact their decision. There does
| not need to be a smoking gun.
| mywittyname wrote:
| I'm sure the author has no business relationship at all
| with Theranos and merely knows her _socially_.
|
| Plausible deniability is useful in this kind of situation.
| anthony_romeo wrote:
| My main point from above:
|
| > I do get frustrated seeing these sorts of vague cynical
| quips levying *specific* accusations based more upon a
| gut plausibility of a scenario rather than a clear
| outline of information.
| elzbardico wrote:
| We got it and I couldn't possibly agree more if you
| didn't obnoxiously cut and pasted the same criticism for
| every subsequent message that failed to satisfy your
| standards. Sometimes people don't get our point, so we
| just move on
| cormacrelf wrote:
| They said:
|
| > writing in the New York Times Magazine about Visionary
| Tech Entrepreneurs with, um, no conflict of interest
| whatsoever I'm sure.
|
| The only assertion is that she was married to a Visionary
| Tech Entrepreneur and doing puff pieces for Visionary Tech
| Entrepreneurs. Like seeing an article by Michelle Obama
| about how democratic politicians these days are great.
| Nothing deeper than that I think. It was an eye roll in
| text form.
|
| It's not an entirely pointless exercise, though, because
| people should know how powerful figures are related, and
| why they are motivated to do what they do. Journalists and
| billionaires are regular people who when exposed to a
| spouse's daily ideas and reactions will soon bend in their
| direction. We should expect this from Laura. And we should
| be better equipped to dismiss it, because she was wrong.
| anthony_romeo wrote:
| My main point from above:
|
| > I do get frustrated seeing these sorts of vague cynical
| quips levying *specific* accusations based more upon a
| gut plausibility of a scenario rather than a clear
| outline of information.
| cormacrelf wrote:
| I edited in a response to that, to the effect that this
| kind of vague accusation is not that vague, people are
| predictable, and we should know who we get our
| information from.
| anthony_romeo wrote:
| Understood -- I can agree with that in general.
|
| BTW I totally understand that HN is not Debate Club, and
| that comments aren't required to be formal, rigorous,
| evidence-based arguments. Occasionally I just feel
| compelled to point out times when beliefs about people in
| general are used to justify accusations against specific
| people in specific circumstances -- even when I can
| empathize with the original sentiment, as was the case
| with the OP.
| biztos wrote:
| I did clarify, but I'm curious what specific accusation
| you read from my comment.
|
| I re-read it a few times and I don't see one regarding
| Theranos other than sloppy writing. My "gut plausibility
| of a scenario" that the author is pumping up her
| husband's portfolio company in an NYT article is pretty
| easy to validate by reading the article itself, it just
| happens to not be Theranos.
|
| Are you seeing something that's not there, or am I
| failing to see something that is?
| anthony_romeo wrote:
| Thanks!
|
| BTW I agree with your overall sentiment. Sorry if I was
| too obnoxious with my post. Sometimes I overthink things
| (such as with the rest of this comment).
|
| On your comment:
|
| > > She only pauses in her work to run -- seven miles a
| day.
|
| > -- Laura Arrillaga-Andreessen, yes that Andreessen,
| writing in the New York Times Magazine about Visionary
| Tech Entrepreneurs with, um, no conflict of interest
| whatsoever I'm sure.
|
| > Turns out Palantir's Alex Karp was also "harnessing
| goodness through technology." No idea how she missed Adam
| Neumann.
|
| > https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/10/12/t-magazi
| ne/el...
|
| My issue is only with the first two lines, therein I can
| only discern one meaningful interpretation given the
| context.
|
| 1. You begin with a puffy quote from the article about
| Elizabeth Holmes
|
| 2. You name the author and publisher
|
| 3. You commented that she was writing "with, um, no
| conflict of interest whatsoever I'm sure" -- which is
| most likely sarcasm and that you suggest the opposite is
| true.
|
| Therein is a claim (or at least a stated belief): that
| the author had a conflict of interest when writing about
| Elizabeth Holmes.
|
| The nature of the conflict wasn't clear. I looked it up
| (and later posted an article which asserted such a
| conflict) but didn't find any clear connections between
| the Andreessens and Holmes/Theranos specifically.
| biztos wrote:
| In your #3 you seem to have overlooked the phrase "about
| Visionary Tech Entrepreneurs," which is what the eye-roll
| about conflict of interest pertains to.
|
| I get what you misunderstood and I think I now get why,
| but I disagree that it's what the "verbal eye roll" (love
| that phrase from another commenter) is actually doing on
| the, er, page. Guess we can summon the English teachers
| now, but I'm sticking to my style. Thanks for taking the
| time to explain.
| anthony_romeo wrote:
| That's fair
| AlbertCory wrote:
| I don't think there's a literal "conflict of interest" but
| there's definitely a "protect your friends" thing going on.
|
| Laura is from the rich Stanford/Menlo Park VC/Palo Alto
| crowd, and that's Holmes' base of support as well.
| anamax wrote:
| > Laura is from the rich Stanford/Menlo Park VC/Palo Alto
| crowd, and that's Holmes' base of support as well.
|
| What support did Holmes have in SV?
|
| Yes, Draper put in some early money and Ellison put in
| some money, but the vast majority of Theranos' money
| seems to have come from outside the valley. (Yes, George
| Schultz lives in SV, but he's part of the SV investor
| "scene.")
| AlbertCory wrote:
| You're thinking of the Sand Hill Road VCs, I guess.
| You're right: not much if any.
|
| However, Schultz was in the Hoover Institute (on the
| Stanford campus), and he introduced her to lots of other
| government / defense heavyweights. James Mattis actually
| testified at the trial, for instance. Once you have a
| prestigious backer, the others fall in line like sheep.
|
| I actually met Laura once, before she married Marc. Those
| people all know each other, believe me (I'm not one of
| them, in case you were wondering; it was some charitable
| thing).
| anthony_romeo wrote:
| My main point from above:
|
| > I do get frustrated seeing these sorts of vague cynical
| quips levying *specific* accusations based more upon a
| gut plausibility of a scenario rather than a clear
| outline of information.
| CRConrad wrote:
| Adam, or Alfred E...?
| nathanvanfleet wrote:
| I think that Fox news has been around enough that people
| really don't expect any media to be neutral anymore. It just
| seems natural and normal for any media outlet to be
| vertically integrated into something. Washington Post seems
| to be anti union and against billionaires being taxed?
| Whatever.
| autokad wrote:
| when fox news came out, most news agencies (maybe all) were
| already left, so it choose to do something different and
| liberals have been bemoaning that ever since.
| hidudeurcool wrote:
| cscurmudgeon wrote:
| It is funny that TED has removed her talk.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBvzKp0AERE
| [deleted]
| joelbondurant1 wrote:
| csours wrote:
| I'm reading the jury instructions here:
| https://cand.uscourts.gov/wp-content/uploads/cases-of-intere...
|
| Would the jury get this document with the blue and yellow
| highlighting??
|
| > Language proposed by Ms. Holmes, and objected to by the
| government, is highlighted in blue. Language proposed by the
| government, and objected to by Ms. Holmes, is highlighted in
| yellow.
| neom wrote:
| The Lawyer You Know broke it down pretty well:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45FzkrUjh_4
|
| (but no, what you linked are a conference hearing preliminary
| proposed instructions for parties objections)
| textcortex wrote:
| Anyone got suprised?
| maxcan wrote:
| DAE remember people dismissing the original critical media
| coverage as being sexist and just trying to take down a
| successful woman in tech? Wonder if we'll hear any apologies to
| those authors..
| ciabattabread wrote:
| Are you talking about twitter commenters or news organizations?
| Provide samples please.
| henryaj wrote:
| https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/15/opinion/elizabeth-
| holmes-...
| chewmieser wrote:
| That's an opinion piece that still even states "She should
| be held accountable for her actions as chief executive of
| Theranos."
|
| Are there any actual articles with the message the op is
| suggesting?
| maxcan wrote:
| more twitter commenters, but IIRC some well known ones. TBH,
| I don't really want to spend the time to go digging through a
| bunch of twitter searches to find them.
| chrononaut wrote:
| For those wanting to see the Theranos story as it unfolded from
| HN's perspective, here's a summary of some of the major threads
| over the years until early 2016:
|
| - 2013/09/08 - Theranos (theranos.com):
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6349349 (113 comments)
|
| - 2014/06/26 - This CEO is out for blood (fortune.com):
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7951019 (97 comments)
|
| - 2015/04/26 - Scientists skeptical about Theranos blood test
| (businessinsider.com):
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9440595 (94 comments)
|
| - 2015/07/03 - FDA approves Theranos test for HSV-1
| (fortune.com): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9823638 (24
| comments)
|
| - 2015/09/21 - How Playing the Long Game Made Elizabeth Holmes a
| Billionaire (inc.com)
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10252183 (82 comments)
|
| - 2015/10/15 - Theranos Has Struggled with Blood Tests (wsj.com):
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10391313 (87 comments)
|
| - 2015/10/16 - Theranos Dials Back Lab Tests at FDA's Behest
| (wsj.com): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10397149 (86
| comments)
|
| - 2015/10/18 - Theranos Trouble: A First Person Account
| (mondaynote.com): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10408811
| (45 comments)
|
| - 2015/10/27 - Theranos didn't work with the huge drug company it
| supposedly made money from (theverge.com):
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10459905 (113 comments)
|
| - 2015/10/28 - The FDA's notes from its visit to Theranos' labs
| don't look good (businessinsider.com):
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10462678 (97 comments)
|
| - 2015/10/29 - Theranos, Facing Criticism, Says It Has Changed
| Board Structure (nytimes.com):
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10471152 (65 comments)
|
| - 2015/12/20 - "Theranos Founder Faces a Test of Technology, and
| Reputation" (nytimes.com)
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10765562 (102 comments)
|
| - 2015/12/28 - "At Theranos, Many Strategies and Snags" (wsj.com)
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10799261 (126 comments)
|
| - 2016/01/25 - "Problems Found at Theranos Lab" (wsj.com)
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10965167 (76 comments)
|
| - 2016/01/27 - "The letter the Feds sent to Theranos" (vox-
| cdn.com) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10983747 (192
| comments)
| abyssiana wrote:
| Collectors want some bits of Theranos goods, the croud of
| compatriots judging woman's decission to have a child in tough
| times, the level of hateness is destroying all the metrics. I
| hope despite all this noice all investors that were sweating
| their money on politics lies, despite all brainless jodgmental
| underdogs she will get the minimum punishment.
| wnevets wrote:
| yawaworht1978 wrote:
| This is dated Nov 2013 and it's a hilarious read.
|
| People from the fields have laughed about her and Theranos for a
| long time.
|
| https://forums.studentdoctor.net/threads/theranos.1043576/
| rgdsmtn wrote:
| Federal law can't regulate commerce unless it's interstate
| commerce. So the wire in the wire fraud part is the handy
| jurisdiction claw so that this is prosecuted by SEC.
| notch656a wrote:
| Wickard v Filburn would have a word with you. It's why
| intrastate drug sales or making your own machine gun still
| spells federal jail time. The federal government has decided
| basically anything involving producing/consuming/possessing
| goods, even for your own consumption in state never entering
| commerce, is interstate commerce.
| yalogin wrote:
| I have to say I am a little surprised. I expected her to not be
| convicted and end up with millions of her scammed money and
| slowly make her way into the entrepreneurial circle. Glad she is
| convicted though.
| beebmam wrote:
| Sending fraudulent people to jail for a long, long time is
| fundamental to running a healthy society. One of the reasons the
| US is a decent place to live compared to other countries is
| because we actually prosecute frauds and criminals here.
|
| Let's start seeing some other countries around the world start
| doing this, like India, Russia, and China. My 80 year old mother
| was recently tricked into wiring money by Indian scammers
| threatening her. I'm really sick of this shit.
| nr2x wrote:
| We pick a sacrificial lamb once a decade to give the appearance
| of enforcement without addressing root causes.
|
| See - 90s: Enron; 00s: Madoff; 10s: Holmes
| ipiz0618 wrote:
| Are you sure you want standards like Russia or China? The
| definition of "fraudulent people" there might just
| be...different
| user_7832 wrote:
| > One of the reasons the US is a decent place to live compared
| to other countries is because we actually prosecute frauds and
| criminals here. Let's start seeing some other countries around
| the world start doing this, like India, Russia, and China.
|
| I'm really not sure fraud is the biggest issue plaguing these
| countries... corruption is definitely an issue (though the US
| has in some cases legalized it into lobbying and PACs and the
| like). It's great that people doing scummy things are held
| accountable, but are the Sa cklers of Purdue P harma in prison?
| They've (unarguably) hurt and killed way more than Holmes did,
| but where's justice for that?
| refurb wrote:
| Nobody said the US system was perfect, just better (along
| with other developed countries that have rule of law).
|
| I lived in a developing country for a while and the
| corruption can be maddening. You might agree to partner with
| someone to buy property, they take your money and cut you
| out. In corrupt countries, you might be entirely screwed -
| that person has too many connections and influence, nobody
| will touch them.
|
| At least in countries with rule of law you could sue them.
| You might not win or be made whole, but at least there is a
| system that is somewhat dependable.
| user_7832 wrote:
| I agree, but also disagree. Look at the entire Epstein (and
| co.) trials - the rich and well connected are thoroughly
| protected across the world. Yes, it's more likely that you
| can hold people accountable but only to an extent. (Fwiw
| I'm from India so I'm familiar with the system, and I fully
| agree it's far from perfect)
| shoulderfake wrote:
| How many wall st honchos went to jail for the subprime
| mortgage crash ?
| niyazpk wrote:
| > Sending fraudulent people to jail for a long, long time is
| fundamental to running a healthy society
|
| Really?! Interesting...
|
| I agree, a functioning society needs good law and order, and
| some way to prosecute and bring criminals to justice.
|
| But I am personally not convinced that sending someone "to jail
| for a long, long time" is the solution. How is that productive?
| I think we need to come up with better ways to serve justice
| than physically restricting otherwise smart or productive
| individuals to a room for decades on end. As soon as we are
| done with abolishing the death penalty, I would want us to
| start looking at abolishing this "decades long locking up" of
| folks. I don't have a good solution as I said, but I am
| convinced that this is not it.
| yCombLinks wrote:
| It's net productive because it removes the large negative
| productivity from fraud / other crimes from society.
| flunhat wrote:
| > But I am personally not convinced that sending someone "to
| jail for a long, long time" is the solution. How is that
| productive?
|
| At least for murder, one of the strongest predictors of
| whether a person will kill is if they've killed before. So
| prison is productive because it makes it more difficult
| (though not impossible) for a person to keep killing.
| rectang wrote:
| There are many different philosophies of justice. Personally,
| I find "restorative justice" the most compelling, especially
| when tempered with the practicality of "preventive justice".
| But there is also "rehabilitative justice", along with
| "retributive justice" which is closest to revenge and thus
| will never lack for popular appeal.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| It is the worst solution, aside from all of the others.
| seibelj wrote:
| The length can be debated, but jail wastes the most priceless
| resource you have - time. That's why it's a punishment.
| taeric wrote:
| I think the question is whether punitive policies work in
| that way. I'm fairly comfortable saying this person getting
| locked up for a long time will probably not deter too many
| others from doing similar, at a personal level. I suppose
| it can be argued that it doesn't have to act as a deterrent
| to individuals at a high rate, but to groups? But... why
| aren't we then hearing about everyone else that enabled
| this? (That is, this just encourages more folks to make
| sure to have a scape goat.)
|
| Or, do we really think it was down to just this one
| person's actions?
| vicda wrote:
| Trying to abolishing imperfect parts of society with no
| tested replacement solution is a dangerous game.
|
| Some people are or became irredeemably antisocial and need to
| be kept away from society at large. Watch any liveleak video
| around the mexican cartel if you need a reminder of what
| evils people are truly capable of.
|
| That being said, sure want to properly reintegrate everyone
| possible. But society understandably does not exactly welcome
| past offenders back with welcome arms. It is kind of hard to
| be productive again when few places will even consider hiring
| you. That isn't a stigma you can just wish away.
| beebmam wrote:
| The point of sending them to jail for a long, long time is to
| protect society from them. Honest people don't deserve to
| live in a society filled with liars and cheats and conmen.
| Send them straight to hell
| thyrox wrote:
| Sorry this is for my own curiosity because I know nothing about
| US legal system, but I was watching this documentary recently
| about Bikram Choudhury, a yoga guru who was being prosecuted for
| several sex crimes and also had an arrest warrant issued against
| him. But in the documentary he successfully managed flee to
| Thailand then Mexico. They even managed to track him but he just
| said fuck off and that was that. Did not face any jail time and
| now he is back to conducting his Yoga sessions.
|
| My point is what stopped Elizabeth Holmes from doing something
| like this? She surely knew what was coming her way and she is
| kinda unscrupulous too, so why didn't she run?
| andi999 wrote:
| Could anybody explain why this is wire fraud and not normal
| fraud?
| shawabawa3 wrote:
| Wire fraud just means fraud committed using electronic
| communication. They presumably chose charges of wire fraud as
| they had evidence of her communications (texts, presentations,
| recordings) implicating her in fraud
| tptacek wrote:
| Time to kibitz on the likely sentence! You can get the federal
| sentencing guidelines here:
|
| https://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/guidelines-manu...
|
| They're long and mostly not relevant except for the sections
| pertaining to Holmes conduct.
|
| Here's the indictment:
|
| https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndca/page/file/1135066/download
|
| Holmes was found guilty of one 18 USC 1349 charge, and 3 18 USC
| 1343 charges; the 1343's she was found guilty on were in amounts
| ranging from $100k to $100MM(!).
|
| It should be possible to come up with a better guess than the New
| York Times' "20 years per count, but likely served concurrently".
| cosmotron wrote:
| You can also try out this tool I saw shared on another thread:
| https://www.sentencing.us/
| droidno9 wrote:
| Don't discount the possibility that she'll have her sentence
| commuted by a future President. Look at the roster of political
| heavyweights that she was able to attract to the company. It
| wouldn't surprise me if one or more of these people still have
| an affinity for her and, at the right time, throw some good
| words in the President's ears on her behalf.
| runeks wrote:
| This disgusts me. The president should not have the power to
| free anyone from prison. If the laws are broken then (attempt
| to) change those, but otherwise you're just saying "yeah,
| you're guilty, but I like you so you don't need to serve your
| time like everyone else".
| nikanj wrote:
| I believe it was originally designed to be a safety valve
| in the system. A person can be found guilty because the
| laws are blind, but if a (loud) majority of the population
| thinks it was a misjustice, the president can fix the
| situation.
|
| I don't think any of the founding fathers foresaw
| presidents using their power to pardon their friends. The
| whole system is extremely vulnerable to an insider attack -
| very few tools are in place to work around corrupt leaders.
| azernik wrote:
| That was only one of the reasons given in the Federalist
| Papers for its inclusion; the other is the need to be
| able to throw around pardons as a bargaining chip in
| quelling rebellions and civil disorders. The post-Civil-
| War pardons are a classic example - getting people off
| the hook for death-penalty treason stuff in order to keep
| them from going into a new rebellion in a few years - as
| are the post-Vietnam blanket pardons for draft dodgers.
| rsynnott wrote:
| Well, realistically, it was just copied off powers that
| the British monarch had at the time. Lots of the oddities
| of the US presidential institution can be traced back to
| that.
|
| Interestingly, this pattern repeats itself; countries
| which became independent from Britain later on often have
| a far less powerful president, with similar powers to
| when _they_ left. The president of Ireland, for instance,
| is non-executive, doesn't have a veto, and can't commute
| sentences... much like the British monarch when Ireland
| became independent.
|
| As it stands, it's an anachronism that only survives
| because it's _really_ difficult to change the US
| constitution, I suspect.
| tialaramex wrote:
| It's a power Kings have. "The Royal Prerogative of
| Mercy". That's why the President has it, there weren't a
| lot of other examples for the Executive to be modelled
| on. However of course in modern constitutional monarchies
| the King doesn't operate this power any more, for example
| Liz's pardon power is operated by her government and
| ordinarily via some dusty committee looking into
| injustices (the government occasionally has used it
| directly e.g. some guy years into his life sentence for
| murder tackled a terrorist who was stabbing people at an
| event in London, the Pardon power was used to reduce his
| sentence in recognition of this bravery)
|
| The US President should have handed this power over to a
| similarly dusty committee resolving real injustice years
| ago. This would be less corrupting _and_ more effective
| because a President is busy whereas the committee would
| be doing nothing else except investigating the
| circumstances of potential injustice and choosing how to
| resolve them (new trial, pardon, etc.)
| colourgarden wrote:
| Chelsea Manning?
| rendall wrote:
| IIRC the President only has the power to pardon Federal
| crimes, not "anyone".
|
| As for Ms. Holmes, she defrauded very rich and powerful
| people. I would be surprised if she were shown any leniency
| at all, never mind a Presidential pardon.
| tasha0663 wrote:
| Checks and balances. The President doesn't make the laws,
| but (s)he executes the laws. If you strip away pardon
| power, there ain't much left.
| thegreatdukd wrote:
| George Schultz is already dead, and Kissinger is 99 years
| old. By the time a future president is elect I doubt she will
| have someone to call.
| rsynnott wrote:
| She'd want to get on with it; they're mostly fairly elderly.
|
| And the optics would be _awful_; no sensible president would
| do it in the first place.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| > And the optics would be _awful_; no sensible president
| would do it in the first place.
|
| That's obviously no longer a constraint. The optics of
| pardoning Anthony Lewandowski (among many, many others)
| looked awful and he was still pardoned.
| rsynnott wrote:
| I suspect that was peak Ridiculous President Behaviour,
| tbh. Any future president that venal will take care to
| hide it a _little_ better.
|
| And I think that was a little different; in that highly
| polarized environment it was possibly a little easier to
| sell corrupt pardons if they were of people on the
| president's 'team'; at least some of his supporters would
| put up with it on that basis. Holmes wouldn't qualify;
| she's just a generic wealthy criminal.
| mythrwy wrote:
| Marc Rich?
|
| This pardon abuse has been going on for awhile.
| wedowhatwedo wrote:
| In America, we can no longer count on a sensible president.
| rgallagher27 wrote:
| Doubt it, she humiliated these people.
| seehafer wrote:
| From former AUSA, and current white-collar defense attorney Ken
| White:
|
| "She faces a max of 65 years (3x20 + 1x5). And it's not at all
| clear she'll do less than 20."
|
| Apparently the sentences will not necessarily be served
| concurrently.
|
| https://twitter.com/Popehat/status/1478170494130003976?s=20
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| Argh! The linked NPR article on that tweet had me yelling at
| my phone:
|
| > It is unusual for tech executives to face criminal changes
| when their startups collapse under the weight of unrealized
| promises.
|
| That's because it's _not_ illegal to over promise about your
| future results. It _is_ illegal to lie about simple facts
| regarding the present state of your business to attract
| funding.
|
| I'm so sick of so many press outlets framing this as just
| "fake it til you make it" gone wrong, "a page from the
| Silicon Valley playbook", or that it's just an over hyped
| company take to extremes.
|
| No, Theranos was outright, egregious fraud, and most startups
| that "collapse under the weight of unrealized promises" are
| not committing fraud.
| ekanes wrote:
| Absolutely. A bit more fair might be that startups often
| "collapse under the weight of unrealized DREAMS" :)
| Shacklz wrote:
| > No, Theranos was outright, egregious fraud, and most
| startups that "collapse under the weight of unrealized
| promises" are not committing fraud.
|
| Most startups don't get the traction and publicity that
| Theranos got, however. I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of
| founders would go to similar lengths given the chance; they
| just happen to have someone apply some reality check on
| them before things get out of hand.
| camillomiller wrote:
| Lying about the level of development of your social app
| is also quite different than this
| major505 wrote:
| There`s a difference. I worked in a few startups. We make
| promisses that we can expect to accomplish in the future,
| we where clear that whatever we where working was still a
| prototipe or a promissing idea, but it was not ready.
|
| She was going to great lenghts, saying her machine was
| already ready to production, and able to do acurate blood
| tests, when she knew it was impossible, and was using
| regular blood tests to fake results.
| edanm wrote:
| I would be fairly surprised. If only because, again,
| _this is fraud and lands you in jail_.
| mattzito wrote:
| It happens more than you think, in many cases it's easier
| to just sweep under the rug and move on. Few VCs want to
| admit they were swindled, and even fewer want the
| industry perception that they get founders investigated
| for fraud when things go sideways.
|
| Theranos was unique in both the scale of the fraud and
| how non-investors were potentially harmed. Most of these
| are just founders who knowingly or unknowingly get in
| over their head and then basically walk away after having
| lied about the state of things.
|
| I've heard a bunch of stories from VC friends, but the
| one I was the most involved with directly was probably 10
| years ago. My mom mentioned to me that she had been
| chatting with some senior local government official who
| mentioned they had a startup datacenter provider taking
| over a nearby abandoned office complex and converting it
| to a green datacenter, bringing hundreds of jobs to the
| area - had I heard of them?
|
| I had not, and after some digging determined that the
| company had claimed to have a bunch of unique technology,
| and leveraged that to get preferential terms from the
| local government - free rent, no property or payroll
| taxes, and other cash- and non-cash concessions. They had
| also raised millions from private investors by saying
| they had active datacenters with customers and they
| needed money to expand.
|
| Except none of it was true. They had no customers, no
| datacenters, no employees other than the three founders
| and one of their daughters. They had made commitments in
| three different locations over the past three years to
| build a datacenter while simultaneously raising money by
| saying they ALREADY had active datacenters and customers.
|
| I shared this with my mom, who shared it with local
| government, who hand waved it away as nonsense. But
| nothing ever happened at any of these sites, and after
| they ran through the money they filed for bankruptcy with
| revenue of $0 and assets of ~$12k. Their biggest investor
| took control of their land lease from the local
| government. Some investors complained online about being
| lied to, and the local government quietly swept it under
| the rug. I spoke with a local business reporter who
| basically shrugged and said, "yup, you're right, but no
| one wants to talk about it".
| m3047 wrote:
| > Few VCs [...] want the industry perception that they
| get founders investigated for fraud when things go
| sideways.
|
| That would be refreshing! I might pitch to them.
| amitport wrote:
| Look, there is still a big jump from the usual founder
| sharing partial vague optimistic statments (e.g., "our
| algorithm is great"), to the not so common direct lie
| (e.g., "we tested it with statistical significance, it
| works, here you can see these results on these real world
| inputs", while completely faking the results)
| vxNsr wrote:
| That fruit juicer company over promised and under
| delivered, wasn't fraud tho.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| Actually, Juicero over promised AND over delivered, just
| in the wrong way.
|
| I saw tons of teardowns of their machine saying how over-
| engineered it was for something that squeezes a bag of
| precut fruits and veggies.
| orangepanda wrote:
| Under-engineered, if anything. If they had spent more
| time on development, a simpler machine could have been
| built. " _Insert your favourite bridge building quote_ "
| shard wrote:
| > a simpler machine could have been built
|
| That's the definition of over-engineering:
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overengineering
| peteradio wrote:
| Definition written by management who can't tell good from
| bad. Ya see too many engineers got involved I reckon,
| should done what I told em, keep it simple fellas.
| bumby wrote:
| You're right about the colloquial definition but I think
| the OP is more on point about the crux of the issue. Most
| physical world engineering applications are about the
| skill of stripping away as much as possible and still
| getting the job done. It's an exercise of working within
| constraints. "Over-engineering" is ignoring those
| constraints.
| whoisstan wrote:
| Wasn't her and the companies case that they _knew_ what
| they wanted to achieve, wearing the bandaid that
| communicates with the phone to the server _was impossible_
| and that its various simpler versions of devices did
| produce results that did knowingly mislead people about
| their health. That 's is potentially life threatening and
| different from an i.e. chat AI company that blatantly lies,
| this may lead to some peoples misery as well, but Theranos
| had way less network hops leading to health threatening
| outcomes.
| luckydata wrote:
| Agreed, but there's a non zero number of startups I had
| first hand experience with that I would define fraudulent
| without hesitation. They just didn't become as big or
| raised enough money to matter.
| tptacek wrote:
| Yeah, that's a surprising thing for him to say, since he's
| generally one of the loudest voices against this "add up the
| sentences" stuff. The grouping rules are in the sentencing
| guidelines too! Go look!
| dragonwriter wrote:
| It's not surprising, because there's a very good argument
| that the guideline range for what she has been convicted of
| (and taking into account her conduct at trial, which is
| relevant) is _life_ , with the actual sentence capped at
| the statutory maximum of the offenses stacked consecutively
| rather than concurrently.
|
| Now, it's possible that the court wouldn't agree with that
| analysis and find slightly fewer points, or that it would
| agree but would make a downward departure, but...
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| He was just responding to this paragraph in the NPR
| article:
|
| > Holmes' sentencing date has not yet been set. But she
| faces the maximum penalty of 20 years behind bars, though
| legal experts say she will likely face a lesser punishment.
|
| That is, he wasn't arguing that she _will_ serve the max of
| 65, just that the max is much higher than what NPR
| reported.
| throwawaylinux wrote:
| Why does that make it surprising?
| tptacek wrote:
| For one thing, because he's the author of this pretty
| famous post:
|
| https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-
| sentenc...
|
| For another, because the guidelines are pretty specific
| in this case --- that 2B1.1 crimes are charged according
| to --- well, here's the wording from the guidelines: "the
| applicable base offense level is determined by the count
| of conviction that provides the highest statutory maximum
| term of imprisonment.". So "3x20" seems off the table.
| throwawaylinux wrote:
| https://twitter.com/Popehat/status/1478172078092128256
|
| "They run concurrently except to the extent necessary to
| serve the full sentence the judge selects."
|
| When he said it's not clear she'll do less than 20, I
| don't think he meant she might get more than 20, just
| that she might get 20.
| tptacek wrote:
| The thing here is, you get up to around 20 years just
| with a single wire fraud count, because the amounts
| involved here are so high. We're at $143MM in losses on
| the three wire fraud charges together (2B1.1 states
| they're to be summed up), which gets you a 26(!)-level
| enhancement from the base level of 7. That's 12 years (at
| the bottom of the range), and every other enhancement you
| take after level 33 is another ~4 years; there are 3-4
| enhancements (like "sophisticated means") that seem
| likely to apply.
|
| On the flip side, given the huge sums involved, it's not
| easy to make the numbers make sense served consecutively.
|
| Here's an article about grouping:
|
| https://www.josephabramslaw.com/understanding-grouping-
| rules...
| throwawaylinux wrote:
| Yes there's lots of very high and very low guesses as to
| what she might get going around. I'm just commenting here
| specifically on this twitter guy's opinion.
| _moof wrote:
| "This Twitter guy" has probably forgotten more about
| federal criminal law than anyone on this site will ever
| learn. https://brownwhitelaw.com/kenneth-p-white/
| tptacek wrote:
| I missed some guidelines stuff; there's a separate
| section for role in the offense, and another for
| obstruction. The tally I get: 7 (Base
| offense) +24 ($140MM in damages) +2 (10+
| victims) +2 (Sophisticated means) +4
| (Leading role) +2 (Abuse of public trust)
| +2 (Obstructed investigations)
|
| That gets us level... 43. _Yikes_.
|
| Consecutive vs. concurrent isn't the issue here; doing a
| $140MM wire fraud puts you on the hook for an insane
| sentence.
|
| So this is a case where the whale sushi sentence is...
| theoretically possible?! Wow.
| roywiggins wrote:
| Mitchell Eppner agrees with you:
|
| https://mitchellepner.substack.com/p/elizabeth-holmes-
| found-...
| tptacek wrote:
| There is no f'ing way she's getting 65 years though.
| checkyoursudo wrote:
| My gut says that she'll get about 20 (or 20 years worth
| of concurrent), and get out in about 8 to 10.
| roywiggins wrote:
| My understanding is that on federal charges you have to
| serve at least 85% or so of the sentence, even with good
| behavior.
| checkyoursudo wrote:
| Ah, in that case, I'll place my marker on 11 years with
| 9.35 served.
| karlzt wrote:
| Others are guilty too, that number could go down to 20
| months served.
| tiahura wrote:
| Yikes. Plus, my understanding is that > 10 means no
| minimum security camp and > 20 means no low security, so
| she would start off in medium security. - assuming it
| works the same way with woman as with men)
| kstrauser wrote:
| Is that how it works? I'd hope you're wrong, but have no
| reason to think so, because I'd like to believe that the
| kind of prison you're sent to is related to how much of a
| risk you are to others. I'm not remotely an Elizabeth
| Holmes fan, but she isn't going to be beating people up
| in the prison yard.
| Applejinx wrote:
| Do you mean 'how crudely and unintelligently you harm
| others'? It sounds like you're setting up a framework
| where you get sent to the mean prison if you're
| physically bullying people, and the more intelligently
| you deliver your harm the better treatment you get,
| perhaps up to a point where if you're smart enough you
| can harm people on an enormous scale and get, I don't
| know, praise for it instead of prison.
|
| Elizabeth seems the sort of person most capable of
| executing a plan whereby she pulls off a prison break
| through enlisting the aid of a bunch of other prisoners
| who're promised freedom themselves, but in her plan are
| actually there as decoys to be killed. It seems analogous
| to stuff she's already happily done. She is potentially a
| risk even to other prisoners if she carries on as she has
| done. I don't buy that she's not a risk to others.
| kstrauser wrote:
| Well, that's certainly one way to interpret it. Another
| way is that the point of prison is to separate someone
| from society, not to put them in physical harm. If an
| accountant embezzles from his employer, he should do
| time, but maybe surrounded by other accountants and not
| armed robbers.
|
| I'm not talking about just Holmes here, but about prisons
| in general. It's not supposed to be _fun_ , but neither
| is it meant to support a collective revenge fantasy.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > I'd hope you're wrong, but have no reason to think so,
| because I'd like to believe that the kind of prison
| you're sent to is related to how much of a risk you are
| to others.
|
| I think in theory escape risk is a part of it, too, and
| people with extremely long sentences are presumed to have
| rather more motivation to escape.
| kstrauser wrote:
| I guess that makes sense, although on a personal level,
| I'd rather serve time in a minimum security prison and
| get it over with than escape, inevitably get caught, and
| have additional time in a worse place.
| Ntrails wrote:
| I don't know, in principal I'd rather go and live in
| south america on a modest income (assuming you have
| carefully sequestered some investments) for the rest of
| my life than spend 20+ in prison which is effectively the
| rest of my life anyway.
| kstrauser wrote:
| Alright, fair point.
| datavirtue wrote:
| Two years later...article about Holmes beating up someone
| in prison.
| nobody9999 wrote:
| >Yikes. Plus, my understanding is that > 10 means no
| minimum security camp and > 20 means no low security, so
| she would start off in medium security. - assuming it
| works the same way with woman as with men)
|
| I'm curious where you got that understanding. Would you
| mind sharing?
|
| Especially since that could put the khibosh on my
| retirement plans (commit a serious, but non-violent
| _federal_ crime and receive a lengthy -- hopefully the
| rest of my life -- sentence at a minimum security "Club
| Fed"[0] facility).
|
| Free housing, food, health care and clothes with no tax
| liability for the rest of my life? It makes me want to to
| massively defraud some congress-critters once I turn 70
| or so.
|
| Assuming I could be assured of conviction, I'd even hold
| on to the stolen money so it could be returned to the
| victims.
|
| Yes, I'm being somewhat facetious. But decent assisted
| living facilities run from USD6-12k/month and once I've
| spent all my money, it's off to a Medicaid facility that
| isn't much better than minimum security prisons anyway.
|
| This way, I can give my money to those I care about and
| not have to worry about spending down my life savings to
| ~USD2,000 in order to qualify for crappy accommodations
| at a facility that accepts Medicaid patients.
|
| Just sayin'.
|
| [0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/reliable-
| source/wp/2015/...
| ansible wrote:
| > _Free housing, food, health care ..._
|
| Shitty housing, unhealthy, often poorly prepared food,
| and frequently inadequate health care... when it isn't
| denied outright.
|
| Being a prisoner in the USA, especially an elderly one,
| is terrible and shouldn't be joked about.
|
| But being elderly and relying solely on Medicaid also
| sucks.
| hollerith wrote:
| >But being elderly and relying solely on Medicaid also
| sucks.
|
| Agreed, but most US citizens who have worked at least a
| few years during their lives will get Medicare, too,
| which is significantly better.
| nobody9999 wrote:
| hluska wrote:
| If you're going to make really bad jokes, you may want to
| grow a backbone.
| nobody9999 wrote:
| >If you're going to make really bad jokes, you may want
| to grow a backbone.
|
| As a vertebrate, I take umbrage with that
| characterization.
| wisty wrote:
| Prisoners are more likely than the elderly to riot if
| their food is bad.
| chongli wrote:
| A better alternative to a retirement home is to retire to
| a cruise ship. It's actually a lot more affordable than
| many retirement homes and far more luxurious,
| entertaining, and with way better food. You also get the
| benefit of being able to take day trips in various ports
| of call and of course you get full housekeeping services
| like any other cruise passenger.
| namdnay wrote:
| There's no-one on a cruise ship to wash you and take you
| to the toilet. And there are no hospitals to take you to
| when you have a stroke
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > "They run concurrently except to the extent necessary
| to serve the full sentence the judge selects."
|
| Note that that is a _big_ except, when you have lots of
| points, which big $ frauds get you quickly.
| wayoutthere wrote:
| And to note, these are federal charges so there's no parole.
| When you get 20 years in federal time, you may get some time
| off for good behavior but you're going to serve most of your
| sentence.
| bambax wrote:
| I hate Holmes as much as anyone [0], but life in prison (65
| years when you're 37 = out when you're 102) sounds
| unreasonably harsh.
|
| She's not convicted of actually, physically harming anyone,
| esp. patients (which doesn't mean she didn't -- but she
| wasn't found guilty of that); she's convicted of lying to
| investors.
|
| That's obviously bad, and should carry some form of
| punishment. Maybe 5 years? But life?? That's insane.
|
| [0] I read John Carreyrou's book when it came out.
| TheRealDunkirk wrote:
| You don't understand. In our system of capitalism, fleecing
| investors under false pretenses is the gravest of sins. She
| must be punished accordingly, in order to make a legal
| statement to other potential capital thieves.
| morelisp wrote:
| As long as we send people to prison for 65 years, it should
| be people who did the kind of things she did.
| zzbzq wrote:
| The way I see the world today has convinced me Dante's
| Inferno had it right: treachery > fraud > violence
| Hnrobert42 wrote:
| 5 years?! People can get that much for stealing a car or
| jewelry. She stole tens of millions! Not only that, she did
| it through fraud. It's not like you can just build a higher
| fence. For the system to work, it must be free of fraud.
| bambax wrote:
| Fraud is different from theft. Fraud is manipulating
| consent. Theft is taking by force what isn't yours. I
| don't know why everyone seems to be conflating the two
| everywhere in this thread.
| bufferoverflow wrote:
| No, you're confusing robbery and theft. Robbery is taking
| stuff by force.
| Hnrobert42 wrote:
| I did not conflate them. I directly compared them.
|
| In both theft and fraud, the victim is deprived of of
| something. That's why people consider them similar
| crimes.
| Jimmc414 wrote:
| How would you exclude rear ending a car at a red light
| from that set?
| ryathal wrote:
| Intent. Both fraud and theft require intent, rear ending
| a car can happen regardless of intent, and would be a
| much more severe charge if there was intent.
| bambax wrote:
| The question is not just the state of the victim, it is
| (mainly) the intent of the perpetrator and the means
| used. That's why you don't get the same sentence if you
| harm somebody by accident or if you meant to do it.
| blitzar wrote:
| Accidental death and murder both result in someone dead.
| They are not similar crimes.
| 369548684892826 wrote:
| Feel pretty similar from the victim's point of view.
| kube-system wrote:
| The sentiment that sentencing is justified by retribution
| is the number one reason why the US criminal justice
| system is messed up. The concept of right-and-wrong and
| mens rea are inextricably one.
| dahfizz wrote:
| They are not the _same_, but they are extremely similar.
| Do you think first and second degree murder charges are
| "similar"?
| ryathal wrote:
| Accidental fraud generally isn't even a crime though...
| marcusverus wrote:
| In this case, fraud is far worse than theft. She
| defrauded investors of hundreds of millions of dollars
| and spent them on a what was essentially a vanity
| project. She destroyed hundreds of millions of dollars of
| private property.
|
| Destroying 100 million is best compared to something like
| a "killdozer"[0] rampage. Holmes' crime was the
| destructive equivalent of leveling ~300 homes.
|
| [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Heemeyer#The_'Kil
| ldozer...
| spookthesunset wrote:
| Speaking of killdozer, there is an excellent podcast on
| this guy:
| https://swindledpodcast.com/podcasts/season-5/72-the-
| killdoz...
|
| It was very lucky nobody was seriously injured by that
| thing.
| klik99 wrote:
| Just on your last sentence: The ideal amount of fraud is
| not zero, the cost of checking everything is too high. I
| recommend the book "lying for money" which breaks down
| what fraud is and what that tells us about the overall
| system
| whywhywhywhy wrote:
| Sometimes it's not all just about the monetary amount.
| Someone choosing to use the threat of violence or death
| on a single individual one time to even take as little as
| $20 doesn't belong in a society.
|
| Even if you're lying to trick some companies and
| investors to give you millions you're still not as evil
| or dangerous to society as the person who chooses to
| terrorize individuals for their gain. The actions are
| what matters.
| jklinger410 wrote:
| People are just making stuff up in this thread lmao
| ljm wrote:
| I think this is an interesting perspective because there
| have to be some unconscious biases at play to see these
| things so differently, even down to one person 'tricking
| some investors' and the other 'terrorizing individuals
| for their gain'. Furthermore, one of these people is
| 'more evil' and 'more dangerous'. In my own mind there's
| an element of classism involved because of how we see
| these two kinds of people so differently, and how we
| imagine them to live their lives.
|
| In that sense, this CEO could be like the Sackler family
| - responsible for so much suffering across American
| society for the past decade or so, but because the scale
| is so large they've effectively abstracted themselves
| away from the evil and terror they are responsible for.
| The implication being that the opioid addict gets the
| full judgment of the law and society for terrorizing
| individuals to feed their addition, but the people who
| made the addiction possible get away with being
| tricksters. The only reason Elizabeth Holmes doesn't
| approach that level is because she and her startup got
| caught before they could release their fake products at
| scale, before the more serious consequences would begin.
|
| If you ask me, I'd prefer to see both being held
| appropriately accountable, preferably in a way that
| encourages rehabilitation and not retribution or cruelty.
| richthegeek wrote:
| "Do you understand what I'm saying?" shouted Moist. "You
| can't just go around killing people!" "Why
| Not? You Do." The golem lowered his arm.
| "What?" snapped Moist. "I do not! Who told you that?"
| "I Worked It Out. You Have Killed Two Point Three Three
| Eight People," said the golem calmly. "I have
| never laid a finger on anyone in my life, Mr Pump. I may
| be-- all the things you know I am, but I am not a killer!
| I have never so much as drawn a sword!" "No,
| You Have Not. But You Have Stolen, Embezzled, Defrauded
| And Swindled Without Discrimination, Mr Lipvig. You Have
| Ruined Businesses And Destroyed Jobs. When Banks Fail, It
| Is Seldom Bankers Who Starve. Your Actions Have Taken
| Money From Those Who Had Little Enough To Begin With. In
| A Myriad Small Ways You Have Hastened The Deaths Of Many.
| You Do Not Know Them. You Did Not See Them Bleed. But You
| Snatched Bread From Their Mouths And Tore Clothes From
| Their Backs. For Sport, Mr Lipvig. For Sport. For The Joy
| Of The Game."
|
| - Going Postal, Terry Prachett
|
| Fraud is not a zero-victim crime and less than petty
| theft is. Just because the investors can 'afford' it,
| their losses are passed on to society eventually.
| neuronic wrote:
| She's ruined anyway, doesn't mean she should get life in
| prison but I know Americans tend to thrive on cruelty.
| uncomputation wrote:
| Right, and it wasn't cruel at all for her to put out
| medical devices she knew could and did produce false
| results for patients - in one case a false positive for
| HIV - solely for her own gain?
| parineum wrote:
| > Grand Theft
|
| > Grand theft includes theft of property with a value of
| more than $950 or theft of a firearm (any value). The
| penalty for stealing a firearm is a felony, punishable by
| a state prison term of 16 months, two years, or three
| years. In all other cases, grand theft is a wobbler and
| can be charged as a misdemeanor or felony. A misdemeanor
| sentence results in up to one year in jail and a felony
| sentence results in prison time of 16 months, two years,
| or three years. (Cal. Penal Code SSSS 487, 490.2 (2020).)
|
| You actually can't get that much time for stealing a car
| or jewelry. What gives a criminal that much time is that
| "theft" is often actually "robbery", which involves the
| use of coercive violence. Violence is generally punished
| much more harshly.
|
| > California Penal Code 211 PC defines the crime of
| robbery as "the felonious taking of personal property in
| the possession of another, from his person or immediate
| presence, and against his will, accomplished by means of
| force or fear." Robbery is a felony punishable by up to 9
| years in state prison.
|
| > First-degree robbery includes robbery of
|
| > any driver or passenger on a bus, taxi, streetcar,
| subway, cable car, etc., any person in an inhabited
| structure, or any person who has just used an ATM and is
| still in the vicinity of the ATM.4
|
| > First-degree robbery leads to a California state prison
| sentence of between three (3) and nine (9) years.5
| sgt101 wrote:
| I think that there are two components in your argument,
| the personal harm element and social policing. The
| question for me is what responsibility and therefore
| forefit there should be on an individual for the social
| element. Interestingly it seems to me that the more
| libertarian folks are the harsher their view of punitive
| measures for social enforcement seems.
| patrec wrote:
| Personally, I find it desirable that people who commit
| massive fraud in the health care sector get punished
| severely (based on whatever charges they are actually
| convicted of), because chances are someone will actually be
| physically harmed even if that is hard to prove to a
| standard necessary for conviction (even if no actual
| harmful treatment resulted, which seems likely in this
| case, the misallocation of resources to the fraud means
| someone will likely be deprived of a treatment they would
| otherwise have received). So IMO 5 years would be insane --
| Madoff got done for 10 years, and his fraud was much more
| benign (I suspect a very significant percentage of his
| victims knew the returns were to good to be true and that
| someone was being defrauded; they just didn't realize it
| was them).
| Hendrikto wrote:
| > She's not convicted of actually, physically harming
| anyone
|
| She should be though. People had unnecessary and invasive
| medical treatment as a direct result pf her fraud.
| kube-system wrote:
| The jury acquitted her of 4 counts regarding defrauding
| patients. She may have caused them civil harm, but that's
| a different case than what was being considered here.
| OscarTheGrinch wrote:
| Or they didn't receive timely treatment because of her
| fraud.
|
| The actus reus is her fraud, the original criminal act,
| and having decided to do crimes she is also responsible
| for any harm caused.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Actus_reus
|
| In the US is it up to the harmed individuals or their
| surviving relatives to peruse this?
| atlantic wrote:
| Your argument is applicable to all white-collar crime. And
| it's emotionally-based, because she looks like one of us,
| not like a stereotypical thug. But in fact, she lied to
| take money from investors - theft on a grand scale - even
| if she wasn't wielding a sawn-off shotgun and wearing a ski
| mask. Edit: aside from that, I agree the potential sentence
| is very long, but that is characteristic of the US justice
| system, right across the board. In my country, the maximum
| sentence is 25 years, regardless of the crime.
| vasilipupkin wrote:
| looks like one of us? wut?
| kingkawn wrote:
| Lol stereotypical thug cmon man
| neuronic wrote:
| Not to defend her actions, but why do Americans
| particularly insist on severe, inhumane, and
| disproportional punishment? It would be completely
| unthinkable for her to get anything >15 years in Germany,
| likely much much less than that (let'ss ee how Wirecard
| goes). She didn't murder or harm anyone. She committed
| fraud.
|
| As if sending her to prison for 5-10 years wouldn't be
| enough? Who will give her money or believe anything she
| does afterwards? She's done for no matter what. 65+ years
| is just to be cruel and enjoyment of the cruelty.
|
| Even if it _is_ the health sector where harm can easily
| be done, punishments shouldn 't be based on
| hypotheticals.
| metabagel wrote:
| Personally, I think she should get 12 years. That's a
| long time.
|
| I'm an American. As a society, we believe in the
| deterrent value of punishment (which is proven not to
| work). We also see prison as a place to put dangerous
| people in order to protect society. We see only the risk
| of letting dangerous people out of prison, not any
| potential benefit. If we have to lock up 1 innocent
| person to be sure that 9 dangerous people gets locked up,
| those numbers work for us. It's a kind of tunnel vision
| focused on the worst offenders and ignoring the many non-
| violent or rehabilitated offenders.
|
| So, it's just this very one-sided view, very risk averse
| and without much empathy or grace toward the offender.
| patrec wrote:
| > As a society, we believe in the deterrent value of
| punishment (which is proven not to work).
|
| Do you genuinely believe that high-IQ white collar
| criminals are exactly the type of person unable to do
| even the most basic risk-reward analysis?
| metabagel wrote:
| It doesn't seem to have worked for Elizabeth Holmes or
| Bernie Madoff.
|
| According to this fact sheet, "the certainty of being
| caught is a vastly more powerful deterrent than
| punishment". Elizabeth Holmes and Bernie Madoff probably
| didn't think they would be caught.
|
| https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/nij/247350.pdf
|
| NIJ is the research, development and evaluation agency of
| the U.S. Department of Justice.
| metabagel wrote:
| Also, I think we tend to minimize how hard it is to serve
| time in a cage. And when people come out of prison and
| commit further crimes, we assume they didn't spend enough
| time behind bars. It's the one and only solution to the
| problem. If it's not working, we apparently just need
| more of it.
| kingkawn wrote:
| Not sure why you replied to me, I was objecting to the
| parent comment's casual endorsement of a racist
| archetype.
|
| Also, america sure as shit better not go light on a rich
| lady who sold profit dreams to old men while giving
| outrageous sentences to poor people everyday. You want to
| talk about criminal Justice reform she is definitely last
| on the list of people who deserve leniency.
| catillac wrote:
| "She didn't murder or harm anyone. She committed fraud."
|
| Fraud is harm.
| kesselvon wrote:
| I think what they're saying is fraud isn't murder. The
| median murder sentence in the US is like 15 years.
| crispyambulance wrote:
| > why do Americans particularly insist on severe,
| inhumane, and disproportional punishment?
|
| Part of the reason is because punishment is so wildly
| variable and also sentences are almost always shortened
| drastically. It never looks like justice prevails. A "20
| year sentence" is never _actually_ "20 years", it could
| easily end up being a few years + probation, or even
| less.
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| Misdiagnosing people is not harmless. Compare it to
| selling snake-oil cures, that prevent folks from getting
| actual medical help. It could kill people. Not harmless,
| done at a huge scale, and probably killed people or
| shortened their lives.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| On the other side, one might make the argument that
| someone with millions of dollars to spare on early-stage
| investments should _also_ be able to do their own due
| diligence on investments - otherwise, why would the
| status "accredited investor" be required? And,
| implicitly, that people like Holmes and Madoff who decide
| to exploit greed and unprofessionalism serve a vital
| purpose in a free market by acting as predators removing
| weak elements from the market.
|
| Experts have warned from the beginning that Theranos made
| unrealistic to impossible announcements. Anyone investing
| at that scale _without_ consulting experts IMO does not
| deserve protection from the law.
|
| If Theranos is one thing, it is a real life example of
| why group dynamics and investing don't mix, and why the
| best thing to come out of r/wallstreetbets is the saying
| "do your own DD".
| bumby wrote:
| I think that argument gets lost when the company actively
| lies. In Theranos' case, they forged letters by Pfizer
| claiming the system was validated. If a company is
| forging, say accounting books, it's hard to claim due
| diligence would have prevented being swindled.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > In Theranos' case, they forged letters by Pfizer
| claiming the system was validated.
|
| Wirecard did the same with accounting statements from the
| Philippines, and EY accepted them without verifying that
| the statements are correct at the bank offices, they
| didn't even cross check if the billions of dollars could
| even be on the books of the Philippine banking system,
| and now EY is in hot waters.
|
| If I were an investor and were presented with claims of
| validation of a technology that is hotly contested, the
| very first thing I'd do is call up or otherwise contact
| the issuer and verify the authenticity of that claim.
| It's like ten minutes to find out the contact information
| of Pfizer's Investor Relations team and compose a letter
| - investors who are unwilling to commit at least this
| little bit of verification deserve to be relieved of
| their money and office.
| bumby wrote:
| EY = Earnst & Young?
|
| You bring up good points (although I think I disagree
| with your conclusion that people 'deserve' to be
| defrauded). There seems to be active collusion at times
| between oversight and the companies being audited. This
| isn't the first time EY has been accused of this and we
| see it with credit ratings agencies too.
|
| I think I come to a different conclusion because we all
| outsource our quality assurance on a daily basis. Did you
| review the airworthiness certificate of the last plane
| you flew on? If not, do you "deserve" to crash because
| you outsourced to the FAA without verifying it yourself?
|
| I'd say the blame should fall to the third party auditors
| who failed the system, not necessarily to those who
| trusted them.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > Did you review the airworthiness certificate of the
| last plane you flew on? If not, do you "deserve" to crash
| because you outsourced to the FAA without verifying it
| yourself?
|
| Am I a normal airline passenger/pilot or did I sign up as
| a test pilot for experimental / new / freshly repaired
| aircraft?
|
| The latter get higher pay _simply because that risk is
| part of their job_ , and to my knowledge test pilots have
| the option to refuse jobs they deem to be too dangerous.
| Same is for investors, with the difference that human
| lives can irrevocably be lost whereas money is only a
| virtual thing.
| bumby wrote:
| I don't think that's a good analogy to illustrate the
| risk profiles. You are incurring a risk by getting on a
| plane, but you have generally assumed that risk is
| mitigated by a third party verification process (namely,
| certification by the FAA in the U.S.). Likewise, an
| investor relies on third parties (auditors, SEC, etc.) to
| mitigate risk. Test pilots, by definition, are flying
| non-certified airframes meaning they are paid to take on
| the additional risk not mitigated by a third party
| verification process. This is why many investors will
| abstain from investing in companies from countries with
| weak third party certification processes.
|
| The system breaks down when the third party is corrupted
| or incompetent in terms mitigating that risk. If we're
| going to say investors/airline passengers 'deserve' an
| outcome regardless of the role of a third party verifier,
| I'd probably say there's no reason for an SEC, FAA,
| audits, or even journalists for that matter. We've
| largely said as a society those organizations play an
| important oversight role in mitigating risk.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| There's a difference in the term "investor".
|
| Your everyday normal "retail" investor _should_ be
| protected by the law and regulatory agencies, e.g.
| requirement that companies offered to trade their stocks
| for unqualified investors need to follow SEC guidelines
| on accounting and business best practices, that insider
| and politicians ' deals are regulated/reported, that
| environmental, consumer protection and labor laws are
| followed and that such companies are audited for
| compliance. For investment vehicles (e.g. funds, stock
| options that are not part of "employee stock" programs),
| that the risk of major or complete loss is limited
| (=investments done by these with the assets of normal
| investors should follow the same rules, and that
| investments into assets requiring accreditation do not
| exceed 20% of the assets under management of the
| investment vehicle). Obviously, that also limits the
| return of investment aka the pricing of risk.
|
| Accredited investors / investment vehicles allowed to
| invest in high-risk assets however? The accreditation
| should represent an exchange: you get the potential to
| higher return of investment unlocked, but as a price for
| that you have to:
|
| 1. prove you can stomach significant losses (=you have to
| own your residence and can only invest 80% of your net
| worth into investments requiring accreditation)
|
| 2. spread investments so that no single or related (e.g.
| by majority ownership) high-risk investment exceeds more
| than 20% of your total portfolio. Exceptions can be made
| for holding companies, SPACs and similar investment
| vehicles, provided that their investors follow the same
| exposure limit.
|
| 3. prove you/your staff are actually qualified to make
| qualified decisions: professional education (e.g. a
| university degree in economics, finance and related
| subjects or training provided as part of employment at a
| bank or other financial institution) and the time to
| adequately review the companies you invest (=someone who
| works 60 hours a week in a non-finance related job should
| not be assumed to have enough free time and mental
| capacity to review and follow-up documents)
|
| 4. waive your right to protection by regulatory agencies
| and the judicial system to a degree that reasonably
| expectable efforts (such as calling up certification
| issuers to verify authenticity of a certificate) have to
| be undertaken.
|
| 5. agree to be held fully liable for your loss _and the
| loss of your clients_ if you violate the rules or act
| negligently.
|
| That way, the assets of the majority of the population
| are protected against loss of their investments, actual
| professionals now have a monetary incentive to
| responsibly invest their assets, and auditors have the
| incentive to actually do their job (and if they do not do
| that on their own, their liability insurance will make
| them do!).
|
| A case could also be made for an intermediate class of
| investor to allow people _not_ meeting the criteria to
| invest a limited portion of their assets (e.g. cap at 20%
| of net worth excluding primary residence, require a
| minimum net worth of 200k $) into high-risk investment.
|
| We do the same with other high-stakes jobs (doctors,
| pilots) and organizations (see e.g. how cyber-security
| insurances force companies to introduce IT security
| measures as part of providing insurance coverage) - why
| don't we do the same with the finance industry? There
| have been more than enough high-profile cases now, some
| of which actually caused global crisis events.
|
| ETA: Additionally, "margin trading" should be banned or
| at least strictly regulated for _all_ investors. The
| amounts one can see in the "Loss Porn" section of
| r/wallstreetbets are simply inconceivable. No one should
| be able to YOLO their retirement funds into Gamestop ffs,
| and no one should feel forced to off themselves because
| their bank showed them a 730k US-$ margin call [1].
|
| [1]: https://www.forbes.com/sites/sergeiklebnikov/2020/06
| /17/20-y...
| bumby wrote:
| This clarifies your position well and I largely agree. It
| wasn't immediately apparent from your earlier post that
| you were talking about the specific case of accredited
| investors.
|
| Regarding the margin call type investments, I would add
| it's not to just prevent endangering oneself but protects
| society as a whole. As a layman looking at past economic
| bubbles, it seems the one corollary is excessive
| speculation coupled with excessive leverage.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| The key thing with regulating margin trade is that most
| home loans have less equity requirements than margin
| trading accounts - you can get homes with _zero_ equity
| sans closing costs these days, while you have to maintain
| at least 25% equity in a margin trading account, and
| people don 't have much of an issue with either.
|
| As long as the economy, the financial, employment and
| housing markets behave somewhat reasonable, even extreme
| leverage is not a problem... but in sudden uncontrolled
| crashes, that amount of collective leverage explodes
| backwards and everyone has a problem.
|
| I'm actually not sure if it is possible to regulate
| margin at all to a resilience degree that stands up to
| market depressions, given that debt and leverage are
| essential to the working of _any_ economic system
| (including all the various forms of socialism!) in a
| scarcity-based world itself.
| [deleted]
| metabagel wrote:
| For the most part, it wasn't really possible to perform
| due diligence in this case, because Theranos refused to
| submit to an audit, and otherwise lied and actively
| prevented investors from getting the true story. For that
| reason, some potential investors walked away.
| datavirtue wrote:
| She straight up said she was backed by partnerships with
| big pharma and that the device was working. I would have
| invested in a heart beat given the claimm. Lying at that
| level is insane. She need removed from the presence of
| law abiding citizens as long as possible.
| moron4hire wrote:
| I've been involved in investment due diligence
| investigations. You don't just take people's word for
| that sort of stuff. You literally pry through everything
| and confirm it for sure.
| Boritanian wrote:
| She effectively stole millions. That's multiple lifetimes
| worth of work for a lot of people.
|
| If you assume average salary of 100k per year per person
| with 1/4th of time work per year. that's effectively 400k
| per year per person. He stole a hundred million which would
| be 250 years.
| flexie wrote:
| If it matters how rich the investors she defrauded
| actually are, perhaps she should get just a few months in
| jail:
|
| "Notably, Theranos' investors weren't the usual-suspect
| venture capital firms. Rather, her funding came from
| individuals like former Secretary of Education Betsy
| DeVos, billionaire media mogul Rupert Murdoch, former
| Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and the Walton family,
| among other wealthy elites. Some evidence showed that
| these investors were willing to give Theranos money even
| when Holmes evaded their more probing questions."
|
| https://techcrunch.com/2022/01/03/elizabeth-holmes-
| verdict-g...
| JshWright wrote:
| > her funding came from individuals like former Secretary
| of Education Betsy DeVos, billionaire media mogul Rupert
| Murdoch, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and
| the Walton family, among other wealthy elites.
|
| And there we have the crux of why she was prosecuted...
|
| You're much better off screwing average people, then it's
| just "capitalism".
| rswail wrote:
| That's why she's being prosecuted so heavily, she screwed
| with the wrong people.
| dagw wrote:
| _She effectively stole millions._
|
| From people who could easily afford to lose it and who
| should have known better. None of the people she
| defrauded have a materially worse quality of life than
| they did before.
|
| Her biggest crime was making rich people look stupid, and
| they REALLY don't like that.
| spaniard89277 wrote:
| Money that could have gone elsewhere where there wasn't
| fraud.
|
| I don't get this apologetic comment.
| dagw wrote:
| _I don 't get this apologetic comment._
|
| The crime she was convicted of isn't a crime you should
| spend effectively the rest of your life in jail for. It's
| as simple as that.
| selfhoster11 wrote:
| > From people who could easily afford to lose it and who
| should have known better.
|
| Who in turn gained their money from trickle-up economics
| targeting the working and middle classes, in all
| likelihood.
| jklinger410 wrote:
| This is the inverse of implying the people Kyle
| Rittenhouse deserved to die because of their criminal
| history.
|
| It does not matter at all that they could afford to lose
| it. Her biggest crime was the one she just got convicted
| of, being a fraud and lying for profit.
|
| One side of this conversation is unnecessarily harsh, I
| get that, but the other side of this conversation is
| playing mental gymnastics to try and downplay what she
| did. Both are wrong.
| dayvid wrote:
| In the book Bad Blood, people wanted to come out to
| expose Theranos and she had the most expensive law firm
| in CA basically threaden to sue people into oblivion. The
| person who spoke to the WSJ journalist who broke the
| story and put his name on the record did so because his
| dad mortgaged their house to deal with legal
| implications. Before that there were patients, doctors,
| employees etc. bullied by the company into submission.
| theglocksaint wrote:
| Really? What about the literal stalking by her legal
| team? Two people directly involved in the company were
| suicidal due to the environment she created, one of whom
| did end up committing suicide.
| dagw wrote:
| Apparently not a serious crime it would seem, since no
| prosecutor seems to care. It is very clear that in the
| current court system defrauding rich people is a much
| worse crime that 'accidentally' killing a few poor
| people. Had she gotten drunk and killed someone with her
| car, she would be looking at a much lighter sentence.
| bufferoverflow wrote:
| My prediction: sentenced to 20, out in 10.
| testplzignore wrote:
| Based on a very quick reading, I think the most serious offense
| (the $100M one) would at least land in the 97-121 months
| bucket. If she serves half of that, best case for her is 4
| years. Not too bad.
| metadat wrote:
| Hopefully she'll get more, SV could use a good example.
|
| Otherwise it signals that wantrepeneurs can keep doing it
| with minimal repercussions.
| ajmurmann wrote:
| "Hopefully she'll get more, SV could use a good example."
|
| I knows Theranos was headquartered in Palo Alto for part of
| its life, but is it really a SV company? Looking at their
| board I see mostly old-school business people from a
| construction company, Wells Fargo, and James Mattis and a
| former head of CDC. Only real tech person seems to be
| someone from NetApp. On the investor side, I don't see any
| of the big SV names either. Initial funding came from
| Rupert Murdoch.
| morelisp wrote:
| > is it really a SV company?
|
| The answer to this depends a lot on whether you consider
| e.g. Arrillaga-Andreessen "SV" or not. Holmes certainly
| wanted Theranos, and herself, to be viewed and valuated
| as such.
| marvin wrote:
| You could draw the conclusion that most experienced
| Silicon Valley folks saw it coming.
| atdt wrote:
| Yes, absolutely. https://youtu.be/uJDc4tOU3zo?t=465
| Hermitian909 wrote:
| I think there's some quibbling over what a SV company is.
|
| Theranos was located in SV and Holmes referred to it as a
| SV style company, you might argue this is enough to make
| something a "Silicon Valley Company". I think OP would
| view such a company as one both in SV and embraced by the
| local ecosystem of developers and investors. I think SV
| "learning a lesson" from the downfall of a company only
| makes sense for the latter definition, and I don't think
| Theranos fits it.
|
| In reading Bad Blood it becomes apparent that, Tim Draper
| aside, the SV investor community realized much earlier
| than anyone else that Theranos was shady and either
| pulled their money or stopped investing. As someone
| living here in the area at the time I felt it was common
| knowledge in dev circles that Theranos was shady and
| lying about their capabilities (though not to the level
| that was revealed). Certainly it did not seem to be a
| prestigious place to have on your resume.
|
| Given that the SV ecosystem seemed to largely sniff out
| Theranos before the rest of the world it seems weird to
| expect them to learn a lesson from its downfall.
| mdoms wrote:
| Ok I'm not American so perhaps my perspective is
| different... More than 10 years would be utterly barbaric.
| The 65 years mentioned in another comment chain would be
| well beyond the pale.
|
| I'm no fan of Holmes, but what good does it serve to lock
| up non violent criminals for decades?
| azernik wrote:
| The US generally has much longer prison terms than most
| of the rest of the world. Compared to sentences for
| crimes of different/lesser severity _in the US_ , more
| than 10 years is completely sane and, indeed, fair.
|
| If you have a problem with US sentencing culture, as a
| moral and a political issue you should probably not start
| with rich well-connected scammers.
| Ekaros wrote:
| 10 years for 145 million seems cheap. I believe in linear
| sentencing. The time in prison should linearly scale with
| amount of damages done. Stealing 1000 vs 100 should
| result in 10x sentence. Stealing million vs ten thousand
| an hundred x.
| tptacek wrote:
| It'll be over 10 easy, because she burned a zillion
| dollars, and wire fraud sentences scale with losses.
| budge wrote:
| Agreed. Also the federal government is generally keen on
| appearing "tough on tech" these days
| Crosseye_Jack wrote:
| The BBC said she faces upto 20 years, but predicts she
| will get a much lower sentence because she has no
| criminal history and she is a first time mother with a
| young child.
| wdb wrote:
| Why would having children be a factor? Would the same
| apply for a man with a young child?
| bryanrasmussen wrote:
| you should expect leniency if you had a young child and
| it was a first time offense.
|
| I would also expect leniency if you got the child after
| you were charged, even though that implies people could
| just get kids to look for leniency, there is the idea
| that once someone gets a child they calm down and become
| more cautious. Maybe not so important in cases of non-
| violent, monetary crime.
|
| However as it is commonly thought in society, and backed
| up by science ( https://www.psychologicalscience.org/publ
| ications/observer/o... ), that women take on a more
| nurturing role for the children and the absence of a
| mother would be more traumatizing (statistically, in the
| case of my son he freaks out if I leave but doesn't care
| much about the mother), the father can expect less
| leniency than a woman.
| Ekaros wrote:
| Why should having a child give any sort of leniency?
| Actually the aim of harming that child should increase
| the penalty. I believe in equality, giving discounts on
| crimes because family just seems absolutely
| unquestionably evil and immoral.
|
| If we really think of it, shouldn't single person get
| leniency because him being in jail doesn't hurt others.
| So that can be considered in thinking about planning of
| crime. As others clearly aimed to hurt their families and
| friends by getting in jail in first place.
| PKop wrote:
| Why would a woman get treated better just cause she's a
| woman?
| WillPostForFood wrote:
| Because you are now punishing her, and the child who will
| be deprived of a mother. <- not endorsing this, but
| that's what may be considered.
| Ekaros wrote:
| Clearly this person isn't worthy of being mother. Acted
| an criminal act with aim to harm the child. Thus bad
| mother. And lot of things are learned, so overall it
| might be much better for child to not be around this kind
| of evil human being.
| abyssiana wrote:
| "Acted an criminal act with aim to harm the child." Don't
| see anyone suing her for that one - as an evil human
| being, of course- except for online underdogs screaming
| "crusify her!"
| pessimizer wrote:
| Well, because she's a rich white woman. If she were a
| poor black woman, having children would probably result
| in worse treatment. Having children _after_ being charged
| might get her child taken away; clearly someone who has a
| child while facing significant prison time would be an
| unfit mother.
| microtherion wrote:
| A sentence of 10 years or longer seems excessive in my
| personal opinion as well, but I can't help thinking that
| the baby only entered the picture when she was already
| facing those criminal charges, so there might have been
| an element of calculation involved.
| bruceb wrote:
| She is in her late 30s, she was probably going to have a
| child either way, just good timing.
| cft wrote:
| Given her cold rationality, the timing of the child may
| be her lawyer's advice, to get her sentence reduced. No
| consideration for the actual baby, how it would be raised
| given the circumstances...
| microtherion wrote:
| True, her age may have factored into her decision.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I feel like having a baby when you know you have a high
| likelihood of going to jail is even more evidence of her
| selfish mindset.
| bruceb wrote:
| the alternative is maybe never having a baby.
| creato wrote:
| And?
|
| Never having a baby seems better than having a baby you
| won't be able to be a mother to for 10-20 years. It's not
| unlikely the kid would hate you when you get out of
| prison.
| bruceb wrote:
| Ideal no, but she isn't going to be in prison 20 years,
| most likely not 10 either. Kid will be raised by father
| and family, won't be poor, and it is unlikely kid will
| hate his mom.
| hackerfromthefu wrote:
| The poor baby
| dev_tty01 wrote:
| She has a demonstrated record of cold, amoral
| manipulation and calculation. Just my opinion, but I
| think the child is a clear effort to increase sympathy. I
| would like to be wrong, but I think the truth is more sad
| and horrifying than most decent people can or want to
| imagine.
| tptacek wrote:
| Google "federal sentence table". The "no criminal
| history" thing is directly expressed on the chart (she'll
| be sentenced from the first column); each cell in the
| table is a range of months, and the first-time mother
| thing might get her the lower end of that range. The
| crimes she's convicted of are so severely sentenced that
| it's hard to see her not getting double digit years.
|
| With all the charges grouped, including the conspiracy
| charge, we'd be looking at an offense level around 35 ---
| 168 to 210 months.
| _moof wrote:
| It _feels_ good.
|
| We absolutely love throwing people in prison for
| ridiculous lengths of time, because we are, for the most
| part, violent busybodies.
| PKop wrote:
| deterrence and punishment. it was pretty barbaric of her
| to screw with people's health and blood no?
| bambax wrote:
| Deterrence doesn't work. And she was NOT convicted of
| screwing with people's health (she may or may not have --
| but she was not found guilty of that).
| PKop wrote:
| >Deterrence doesn't work
|
| Absurd statement. Of course it does, if the punishment is
| harsh enough.
| HWR_14 wrote:
| > what good does it serve to lock up non violent
| criminals for decades?
|
| If you're stealing hundreds of millions of dollars, is
| anything less than a decade really a deterrent?
| Especially since sophisticated actors are the most likely
| to be deterred by long prison sentences.
|
| Heck, does it really do any good to lock up someone who
| comes home to find his wife cheating and kills her and
| her lover for 20-plus years? I would contend that locking
| up the white-collar criminal does more good.
|
| But I'll take on your specific example. Any crazy rich
| people out there, I will serve 5 years in a minimum
| security Western European prison for 143MM USD safely
| accruing interest in accounts for when I get out.
| henrikschroder wrote:
| Wait, what, does she get to keep the money she
| fraudulently acquired?
| HWR_14 wrote:
| Sorry to respond a second time, but another thought
| occurred to me. The frauds took place a while ago. Even
| if she had invested half in an index fund, she should
| still have 2x+ of the funds left. I don't know what if
| any interest is charged, but she might be able to repay
| the original investors at 110% and still make a tidy
| amount of cash, depending on what she did with the money.
| HWR_14 wrote:
| I doubt she legally gets to keep all of it. In theory she
| probably cannot keep any, but if it's sufficiently hidden
| or already spent or given away it may be impossible to
| recover. The people she defrauded may accept recoverable
| cents on the dollar to get something back, and she may
| have access to more than she has to return.
| spockz wrote:
| Here in school we learn that the chance to get actually
| caught is the primary deterrent and second the weight of
| the sentence in either monetary terms or time served.
|
| Because people are bad at estimating low probability and
| high outcome expected values. If you are old you might
| even not deterred at all by a very long sentence if there
| is only a small chance that you actually both get caught
| and have to serve the time.
| HWR_14 wrote:
| I think as a general rule, probability is more important
| to dissuade things like speeding or murder. I think
| advanced financial crimes and especially fraud have such
| an inherently low risk of getting caught quickly enough
| (after all, by definition they weren't caught by the
| sophisticated investors who have the most to lose) that
| we will have far more success by having heavy
| punishments.
| P_I_Staker wrote:
| Well, frankly sentences in the USA are barbaric. We also
| have the habit of handing down terms that are impossible
| to satisfy, eg. for probation. They'll take away your
| drivers license then tell you to appear in several
| locations around town to avoid jail (btw a driving
| infraction isn't always necessary, although even if they
| did commit a DUI, that doesn't change the practical
| side). You'll get charged money and taken to jail for
| being too poor. It's not uncommon to resort to crime to
| raise money to pay the state to avoid jail.
|
| All that said, I would hope for at least 8-12 years,
| possibly more. I don't take that sentence lightly and
| consider it very harsh (I can't stand people from the USA
| that consider less than 5 years and "easy sentence"). 3
| years is a serious sentence, and 8-12 is extremely harsh,
| for good reason. It's very important to me to call this
| like it is. There should be heavy handed punishment,
| because this is among our most serious crimes.
|
| She blatantly lied multiple times about a medical
| product. She had a team of enforcers harass people who
| tried to talk. Across the board, it was a very extreme
| case. More importantly, with so much at stake, these type
| of white collar crimes are quite frankly worth committing
| if the sentence is less than 5 years (I'm not sure the
| exact number, but it's at least 5).
|
| For a substantial portion of the population, having that
| kind of wealth and influence for a short time is worth
| it; in some cases, even if you die. So it might not deter
| everyone, but I do think the possibility of spending lots
| of time locked up, will stop a lot of gray area people.
|
| I also think it is necessary for fairness. I care about
| making these crimes "not worth it". At a certain point,
| you're basically letting people keep their ill gotten
| gains. Getting to be king for a decade, then go away for
| a year or two is no punishment at all.
|
| I don't think 10-20 years is necessarily inappropriate.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > I'm no fan of Holmes, but what good does it serve to
| lock up non violent criminals for decades?
|
| "non-violent" criminals can do much more widespread
| damage individually than violent criminals are likely to,
| but are also more likely to be rationally deterrable with
| a sufficient consequences (which anything you'd willing
| gamble against the potential upside of the massive crime
| is _not_.)
| md_ wrote:
| This might be overly handwavy of me, but I struggle to
| see a scenario where a rationale Elizabeth Holmes thinks
| the expected value of what she did is positive if the
| standard sentence is 10 years, but thinks it's negative
| if the sentence is 65 years.
|
| Maybe the takeaway is that criminals (and humans) aren't
| entirely rational, and 65 years is just a great
| "headline" for deterrence. But framing this as about
| deterring rational criminals strikes me as then putting a
| high burden of proof on the argument for 65 vs 10.
| bee_rider wrote:
| > "non-violent" criminals can do much more widespread
| damage individually than violent criminals are likely to
|
| How did you come to that conclusion? It seems like a
| difficult argument to support.
|
| In terms of human life, probably not, right? I mean
| hypothetically the investors could have gone on to spend
| their money on lifesaving ventures and charities but that
| seems like a roll of the dice.
| danmaz74 wrote:
| Not saying this is the case for Holmes', but scams can
| definitely destroy people's lives. It's not just about
| being financially ruined - which isn't a small thing -
| but also the feeling of guilt associated with having
| fallen for the trick.
| throwawaylinux wrote:
| Are we allowed to include executives who lie about the
| dangers of tobacco, asbestos, climate change, or
| politicians and bureaucrats who lie about the evidence
| they use to justify wars, things of that nature -- all
| lies for profit which materially damaged others -- in the
| non-violent bucket to answer your question?
|
| They may not not technically be criminals because the
| government and judicial system protect this class of
| people, so in the interest of liability let's not allege
| they committed any crimes, but in the context of the the
| question yes white-collar or non-violent "whoopsie
| daisies" can do much more widespread damage.
| bee_rider wrote:
| It does, I guess, technically answer my question in
| isolation.
|
| In the context of the broader discussion here, though I
| find it unsatisfying -- Holmes was specifically found
| guilty of defrauding the investors, and (as far as I've
| seen) acquitted of defrauding the patients. I don't think
| the main punishment for tobacco, etc company execs should
| be based around, hypothetically, ripping off investors
| (actually I guess their investors don't feel ripped off
| in many cases).
|
| The main victims, in the case of tobacco and asbestos,
| seem to be people who've essentially been poisoned. This
| ought to be considered a violent act in my opinion.
| Unfortunately the legal system seems to see it
| differently, so again you are correct, but again I'm left
| a bit unsatisfied...
| dave333 wrote:
| Basing severity on dollars stolen is flawed - it should
| based on the percentage of the victims assets stolen.
| Taking $1 million fraudulently from Warren Buffett is not
| the same as taking it from the average pensioner.
| sgt101 wrote:
| She took money of retail investors as well. There is a
| podcast called "the dropout" which has featured done
| pretty ordinary people that lost their savings. Ok, we
| can judge them, just like we will judge all the nft &
| crypto victims, but the suffering is real.
| md_ wrote:
| Definitely this.
|
| For many (though certainly not all) of the investors
| victimized by Holmes, I'm not terribly sympathetic. As
| implied by "qualified investor", if you write such a big
| check, it's sort of up to you to do the homework.
|
| I _do_ have some sympathy for people who got Theranos
| tests and were mislead about their efficacy, but on the
| charges of defrauding patients Holmes was found not
| guilty! (Similarly, I have some sympathy for employees
| who went to work at Theranos and ended up bullied and
| threatened by the company, as with Tyler Schultz, but
| they aren 't represented by any of the criminal charges!)
| bambax wrote:
| The harshness of sentences has zero deterrence effect.
| This has been demonstrated many times. Also, if it had,
| then the US would be crime free, as it has the harshest
| system in the world.
|
| The only thing that has a small deterrent effect is how
| likely a potential offender think they are of getting
| caught.
| vasilipupkin wrote:
| US doesn't have the harshest system in the world and
| harshness of sentences definitely has some deterrent
| effect.
| P_I_Staker wrote:
| Have you studied this kind of crime specifically, and
| looked at specific sentencing terms, eg. 5 vs. 10 vs. 15
| years? I'm guessing no, and more than likely there's no
| data available for this.
|
| My understanding is that even in cases where deterrents
| are known to work poorly, there's still some effect. For
| example, with drug addicts, there are diminishing returns
| in as little as a couple days, but I think there was
| still SOME effect.
|
| It just winds up being mostly pointless, because a
| weekend sentence works pretty much the same as eg. months
| to years or more. You should be careful about
| extrapolating from behavioral studies, and other crimes.
|
| It's not just about deterrent IMO. I also care about
| justice, fairness, and making it not worth it to commit
| white collar crimes. If the sentence is not substantial,
| you've basically gotten away with it to me.
|
| It's worth 1-5 years in prison to spend 5-10 years in
| luxury, being told how amazing you are. Maybe not for me,
| but it certainly is for a lot of people. A ton of white
| collar criminals end up better off for their crimes, if
| you're not harsh enough.
| Hendrikto wrote:
| Non-violent does not mean that she did not cause physical
| harm. People underwent invasive and unnecessary medical
| procedures as a direct result of Holmes' fraud.
| odiroot wrote:
| It would be totally justified to cap it at 10 years in
| this case, provided she's forever banned from being an
| executive in any company. Not sure if it's compatible
| with US laws though.
| danjac wrote:
| Agreed. Holmes is 37, so 65 years is a life sentence.
| From a European perspective, life sentences should be for
| people who are too dangerous to ever allow back into the
| community, or whose crimes are so monstrous society
| requires such retribution - terrorists, child killers,
| serial killers and so on. US sentencing appears very
| vindictive, not so much for trust-fund faildaughters but
| for people of colour arrested for minor drugs offences or
| under "three strikes" laws. Reminds me a lot of the
| "Bloody Code" of 18th century England.
| KumoriNova wrote:
| "More than 10 years would be utterly barbaric." False.
|
| 65 years in prison would be a fair sentence for her.
| Homeless people in America have been sentenced to over 15
| years in prison for stealing $100. Holmes stole an order
| of magnitude more than that. The US justice system needs
| to send a clear message to the would-be fraudsters that
| there are indeed some very serious penalties for being a
| criminal in this society.
| stickfigure wrote:
| > Homeless people in America have been sentenced to over
| 15 years in prison for stealing $100.
|
| Do you have a link for that? I can't tell if this is
| hyperbole or not.
| KumoriNova wrote:
| https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/homeless-man-vs-
| corporate-...
|
| https://www.ktbs.com/news/man-who-took-one-bill-and-
| handed-r...
| stickfigure wrote:
| That is heartbreaking, though I'm not sure the bank
| teller would feel that way after having a "gun" pointed
| at them while the man yelled "this is a stickup". Also,
| the perpetrator may have had prior convictions.
|
| In general we prosecute violet offenses (including the
| threat of violence, even if the gun wasn't real) more
| seriously than nonviolent offenses. While 15 years seems
| excessive (as do most prison sentences in the US, IMO),
| there's a lot of important context missing in your
| statement. Hyperbole might not be the right word, but I'd
| call it "substantially misleading".
| KumoriNova wrote:
| I am curious to know what direction it is that you think
| would be the appropriate direction my comment should be
| leading towards and also, I am curious to know which
| direction you think my comment is actually pointing
| towards with its "substantially misleading" content?
|
| I get the vibe you are a white-collar criminal apologist,
| I could be wrong, but am I?
| archon810 wrote:
| An order of magnitude more than $100 would be $1,000.
| You're a pretty large number of magnitudes away.
| KumoriNova wrote:
| I concur, your statement does indeed check out.
|
| Though, it was my intent to communicate on the interwebs
| with a writing concept often referred to in some circles
| as 'a figure of speech'...
| kbelder wrote:
| Almost an order of magnitude of orders of magnitude.
| [deleted]
| tptacek wrote:
| So, like, the argument would be that it is also barbaric
| to sentence a homeless person to 15 years for stealing
| $100.
| approxim8ion wrote:
| The jaded view on this would be that we should then serve
| justice from the bottom-up, rather than pretending to be
| reformative to let another privileged, white criminal get
| off easy while not fundamentally changing anything. I
| can't say I disagree too much with it either. There is no
| indication that widespread reform in the justice system
| is impending, or that starting here and now would have a
| cascading effect leading to a better, less vengeful
| system for everyone.
| 41b696ef1113 wrote:
| >Homeless people in American have been sentenced to over
| 15 years in prison for stealing $100
|
| Using an existing injustice in the US to defend another
| does not make it right.
|
| I am no fan of Holmes or what she did, but locking away
| people for life is clearly not a winning strategy.
| KumoriNova wrote:
| I'm claiming Holmes is a criminal that deserves to be
| sentenced to the full extent of the law for the crimes
| she has committed. The US needs to hold criminals
| accountable for their actions. Otherwise we will continue
| to have a society full of criminals who exploit the
| justice system's leniency. 65 years in prison is
| completely fair for everything she did. In my opinion
| anyone who believes otherwise either doesn't care about
| the damage she has caused or doesn't fully understand the
| damage she has caused.
| abyssiana wrote:
| PKop wrote:
| How is it clearly not a winning strategy? That doesn't
| seem clear to me. It would be a losing strategy to view
| justice for criminals as "injustice"
| lelanthran wrote:
| >>Homeless people in American have been sentenced to over
| 15 years in prison for stealing $100
|
| >
|
| > Using an existing injustice in the US to defend another
| does not make it right.
|
| While that is true, it is also true that the law must be
| fairly enforced on everyone. Having some people receive
| lighter sentences for similar-in-intent but larger-in-
| scale crimes is not fair enforcement.
| simonh wrote:
| The US is a jigsaw of different legal jurisdictions with
| varying laws, legal standards and sentencing practices. A
| crime in one state with a life sentence might not even be
| a crime in another. I know this is a federal case, but it
| seems unlikely the case of the homeless person was too.
| selfhifive wrote:
| Stealing here would be robbing a person with the aid of
| violence or threat of violence. It's not really the same
| thing.
| x0x0 wrote:
| Beyond stealing piles of money from investors, lying to
| people about medical treatments. Folks were making
| serious medical decisions with the results from their
| faked / half-assed tests.
|
| We should destroy her life for cavalierly playing around
| with other people's lives in that manner. Theranos
| intentionally destroyed the database of test results, but
| their clear goal was to yolo out medical tests.
|
| See eg [1] or [2]
|
| [1] https://mondaynote.com/theranos-trouble-a-first-
| person-accou...
|
| [2] https://www.theverge.com/2021/9/21/22687026/theranos-
| patient...
| bee_rider wrote:
| She should absolutely be put on trial for playing with
| people's medical diagnoses. But that's not the crime
| she's been found guilty of yet, right?
|
| Hopefully screwing around with medical tests will have
| much more serious consequences than stealing money.
| Hopefully this was just the first step, and having her in
| jail will prevent her from tampering with the evidence
| for the more serious crimes. Hopefully we live in a
| society that values lives more than money...
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > She should absolutely be put on trial for playing with
| people's medical diagnoses
|
| She was, but she was acquitted on those charges.
| bee_rider wrote:
| Was she? I saw that she was acquitted of defrauding
| patients, but surely handing out known bad diagnoses also
| has some consequences from a 'risking lives' viewpoint,
| right?
|
| Like if you order some bullets from a gun shop, and the
| guy delivers them by doing a drive-by on your house,
| surely the only legal problem for the deliveryman can't
| be "these bullets were a ripoff, the gunpowder is already
| expended!"
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > I saw that she was acquitted of defrauding patients,
| but surely handing out known bad diagnoses also has some
| consequences from a 'risking lives' viewpoint, right?
|
| The bad diagnostic test in exchange for money is the
| essence of the fraud she was acquitted of, not some
| separate harm.
|
| I mean, it's not impossible she could face state law
| claims about it separate from the federal ones, but any
| federal criminal claims from the same set of actions
| would be foreclosed now by double jeopardy (besides
| retrial on the charges that the jury hung on.)
| [deleted]
| nakedshorts wrote:
| You do realize actual patients got completely wrong
| results on their blood tests, thereby potentially
| jeopardizing their ongoing treatment for pretty serious
| conditions? How is it a "non-violet" crime when we're
| talking about potentially killing patients due to fraud?
| drexlspivey wrote:
| > How is it a "non-violet" crime when we're talking about
| potentially killing patients due to fraud?
|
| Because words have meaning and fraud is non-violent no
| matter how much you stretch it
| JohnBooty wrote:
| I agree with you from a moral perspective, and think
| that's far more important than the financial aspect. But
| she was convicted of other crimes.
|
| Perhaps the judge can factor that kind of thing into the
| sentencing; I'm not sure.
|
| In an ideal world (not that we live in anything
| resembling a perfect world) it seems to me that the harm
| you're talking about would be remedied in separate
| criminal and/or civil trials. Certainly, unless I'm
| mistaken, the victims of the fraudulent tests could still
| file civil suits.
|
| I'm not a lawyer, in case it wasn't blindingly clear.
| md_ wrote:
| She was charged with defrauding patients _and acquitted_
| of those charges!
| JohnBooty wrote:
| Thank you for the correction.
| voltagedivider wrote:
| White collar crimes are non-violet by definition. I'll
| see myself out.
| pharrington wrote:
| American prison terms, in general, are utterly barbaric.
| People can get 10 years for drug possession in this
| country.
|
| Our system is ludicrous, but within its current bounds,
| over 10 years would be just.
| bpodgursky wrote:
| This is a really sad comment. You want to take a 37 year
| old and put her in prison for the rest of her healthy life.
|
| If you want a death sentence, you should have the honesty
| to say so, instead of glibly ending someone's life to "send
| a message".
| ericmay wrote:
| While I don't share in the misanthropic sentiment of the
| OP, it's difficult for me to not sit here and say well if
| you didn't want to go to prison you shouldn't have
| defrauded people and violated the law...
| Karrot_Kream wrote:
| I don't think anyone here is saying she shouldn't be
| going to prison or that she should be going there for
| less than a decade. But spending 65 years in jail for
| _anything_ short of substantially heinous crimes should
| cause anyone to question the motivation behind the
| sentencing. I understand that the wire fraud is what's
| causing the time to stack up here, but a 65 year sentence
| would be ridiculous. I'm much more onboard with a 10-25
| year sentence though, even if there's perjury involved.
| microtherion wrote:
| And her misdeeds did not just cost some wealthy investors
| some money; they seem to have played a significant role
| in the suicide of Theranos chief scientist Ian Gibbons:
| https://www.businessinsider.com/theranos-ceo-elizabeth-
| holme...
| SEJeff wrote:
| Alternatively, there were retirement funds and real
| people whom she defrauded, some of which needed that
| money to live on and now do not have it. Strong
| punishments befit serious crimes. More than 140 million
| defrauded counts as serious. Maybe she shouldn't have
| broken the law?
|
| Besides, she can likely get probation with good behavior
| after a decade or two of time served.
| doovd wrote:
| These retirement funds were invested in theranos?
| KumoriNova wrote:
| I don't want her to serve out a death sentence. I'd like
| her to serve a fair sentence.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| She went on the witness stand and continued to lie,
| showing no indication that she has changed course.
| creato wrote:
| Can you name another "wantrepeneur" that needed deterring
| by this case?
|
| I don't follow startups that closely. The only example I
| can think of is Elon Musk's "full self driving" promises,
| but the gap between promise and reality is a lot smaller in
| that case. Even then, the claims are still mostly future
| timelines, not "it works now, no I can't show you, trust
| me!!"
| stickfigure wrote:
| The Ozy Media guy seems similar enough. Blatantly lying
| to investors about the current facts of the business to
| extract money from them.
| creato wrote:
| It sounds like they are getting similar treatment to
| Holmes: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/10/business/ozy-
| doj-sec-inve...
| joering2 wrote:
| To me the justice system already failed. It supposed to
| protect small people, society, vulnerable entities. There
| are stories how Holmes test were indirect result of someone
| death because they rely on those.
|
| Meanwhile the only real sticking crimes are the one she
| commit against Betsy Davos (dirty corrupted rabbit hole
| warning if you Google her name). Obviously Bets placed few
| phonecalls. It it wasn't some VIP, she would get away with
| that too because all investments comes with risk.
| odiroot wrote:
| I believe you're missing forest for the trees. Some other
| commenters in this thread actually gave better
| explanation but think practically about this.
|
| The prosecutors are not stupid. They have to come up with
| charges that actually stick, otherwise they risk losing
| this case in a spectacular fashion. If they went with an
| angle "X is morally bankrupt and her actions caused some
| deaths", it would make so much harder to prove and get
| the jury to agree to it.
| boeingUH60 wrote:
| Come on. You make it sound like it was only Betsy Devos
| she defrauded. There's a long list of other ultra-rich
| people, including Oracle guy Larry Ellison, Walton Family
| (Walmart owners), and Rupert Murdoch.
|
| Not fair to frame her sentence as Betsy pulling strings,
| even when I'm no fan of that woman for obvious reasons.
| HWR_14 wrote:
| > You make it sound like it was only Betsy Devos she
| defrauded
|
| In fairness, Betsy was 16th in line for for the US
| Presidency when Holmes was being charged and everything
| set up. And were it not for COVID-19 she would have been
| in that position for the entire trial. I'm sure with that
| kind of political power she was pulling some strings for
| vengeance.
| microtherion wrote:
| If you added those names to elicit more sympathy for the
| defrauded investors, you're not exactly succeeding so
| far. You could throw in Henry Kissinger as well, and I
| still wouldn't feel particularly sorry for them...
| boeingUH60 wrote:
| I added them to put things in context and refute the
| statement that Holmes's situation was about Betsy Devos
| pulling strings.
|
| I couldn't care less or sympathize with billionaires who
| have already made back magnitudes of the money they lost
| on Theranos with other investments.
|
| For example, Larry is up $14 billion(!) on a $1 billion
| investment in Tesla in 2018.
|
| https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/larry-
| elliso...
| microtherion wrote:
| Yes, I understand, it was just that the list was not just
| populated with run-of-the-mill meh billionaires, these
| are some of the least popular (at least in certain
| circles) billionaires one could pick (Nighttime noise
| disturbances -- destroying small businesses -
| facilitating genocide -- they really cover a wide
| portfolio).
|
| If Holmes had decided to reinvent herself as a Robin Hood
| figure, she might be feted in Jacobin by now.
| [deleted]
| jessaustin wrote:
| Is there any way that some of those investors/board
| members could get some federal prison time? Just like,
| you know, for justice?!
| dragonwriter wrote:
| Unlike many state systems, in the federal system the sentence
| is close to the actual time you'll serve, short of a
| Presidential commutation or some other special intervention.
| Other than up to 54 days/year good conduct time, there's not
| systematic early release.
| madaxe_again wrote:
| She'll get special intervention - of course she will. I
| doubt she will receive any custodial sentence - perhaps
| house arrest for a few months, definitely a publishing
| deal, movie rights, all the rest.
|
| She'll also probably be President one day. Folks will buy
| into her story of her fighting against a corrupt male
| system for the good of all. Also, the less trustworthy you
| are, the more electable you are.
| hooande wrote:
| people generally serve the majority of a federal sentence.
| serving 75% of sentenced time is much more common than 50%
| xwdv wrote:
| I hope this "girlboss" rots in prison for the rest of her
| useful life. Needs to set a good example.
| avirut wrote:
| Does multiple counts served concurrently mean that the
| effective sentence is just the longest individual sentence?
|
| Also: I'm seeing from various websites that the maximum time-
| left-to-serve for minimum security (federal prison camp) is 10
| years, but nothing definitive - [1] is the most in-depth but
| only specifies this requirement for male prisoners, whereas
| other requirements are clearly distinguished between male and
| female.
|
| [1] https://alanellis.com/securing-favorable-federal-prison-
| plac...
| tptacek wrote:
| Yes, the guidelines are kind of explicit about this for basic
| economic crimes. Ken White's the lawyer, though, not me!
|
| They're actually even more specific for fraud cases, beyond
| the general 2B1.1 basic economic crime rule of sentencing
| according to the most severe count; for fraud, you apparently
| sum up _all_ the losses from _all_ the counts, which has the
| net effect of bumping Holmes up 2 additional levels.
| blackboxlogic wrote:
| Taking note: parallel crimes are more efficient than serial
| crimes.
| [deleted]
| btmiller wrote:
| Look, she _is_ a snake, but if Python can't have true
| parallelism, neither should she :P
| kingcharles wrote:
| > Does multiple counts served concurrently mean that the
| effective sentence is just the longest individual sentence?
|
| Generally, yes.
|
| If her sentence is high she might not classify as minimum
| security (prison camp) and might have to serve some years at
| a medium before being moved.
|
| Remember, federal prison sentences are generally "85%" which
| means you can get 15% off your sentence for good behavior.
| Almost every prisoner will get the maximum 15%.
|
| I didn't read the indictment. Are her offenses
| nonprobationable? Usually non-violent offenses are
| probationable for first-time offenders.
| dave333 wrote:
| Skilling of Enron fame got 24 years and was released after 12.
| That seemed a far worse crime than Theranos IMHO.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| > Skilling of Enron fame got 24 years and was released after
| 12.
|
| That's because his original 24 year sentence was reduced to
| 14 after a Supreme Court case vacated part of his
| convictions.
|
| My bet, based on some calculators I've seen, is that Holmes
| serves (actually in jail) 14-18 years.
| nikanj wrote:
| My bet, based on her net worth, is that she'll die of old
| age before the last round of appeals ends - and serve zero
| days before that.
| Gustomaximus wrote:
| Given she is now convicted and soon to be sentenced,
| won't she be in jail for/during subsequent appeals?
| flatiron wrote:
| she is not currently jailed. i saw on the news this
| morning after her guilty verdict walking out with her
| lawyer. i don't believe they jail you until sentencing
| for white collar crimes since you aren't a "threat" to
| the general public
| Gustomaximus wrote:
| Sorry seems I was unclear in my wording.
|
| I said soon to be sentenced.
|
| And words towards 'won't she be in jail through any
| appeal process.'
|
| But in response to the original comment saying she won't
| get jail time at all due to appeals, do you think she
| will not be sentenced and the appeal with happen before
| then where they disregard this conviction during that
| process?
|
| Anyway, confusion aside I was trying to politely point
| out they seem wrong in their assumption she will never
| see jail due to an appeal process. That's not how the
| process works.
| nikanj wrote:
| You slightly misunderstood my cynicism: I don't think
| they'll overturn this convinction and cancel her
| sentence.
|
| I think she'll only start serving time once the very last
| round of appeals ends - which is going to be many years
| after her death. They'll just Jarndyce v Jarndyce for
| decades to come.
| aqme28 wrote:
| Does she still have any significant net worth? It's not
| like her stock is still worth anything.
| thallium205 wrote:
| Her baby daddy is extremely wealthy.
| youngNed wrote:
| > baby daddy
|
| Non American here, why do people use this infantile term
| to refer to a spouse? Unless I am mistaken, the father of
| her child is her husband - why use another term?
|
| Edit: Thanks everyone for pointing out that you don't
| need to be married to have a child, wow, everyday a
| school day on HN.
|
| But her husband _is_ as far as we know, the father of her
| child.
| NateEag wrote:
| Wikipedia says that she was in a relationship with her
| business partner up until Theranos fell apart.
|
| She then married her current spouse.
|
| "Baby daddy" is often used to imply that the woman is not
| really attracted or attached to the man who fathered a
| child.
|
| I think OP is implying that Holmes hooked up with and
| married the new guy as a cynical ploy to get a war chest
| for the impending legal actions.
|
| I can't speak at all to Holmes' motivations, but it
| certainly doesn't conflict with what I read on Wikipedia,
| or with her apparent ethics.
| NikolaeVarius wrote:
| You dont have to be married to have a child.
| bogwog wrote:
| Women aren't always married to their baby's daddy.
|
| Not exactly sure where the term came from, but I know
| I've heard it in songs, seen it in movies and on TV, etc.
| It's just a popular phrase.
| PavleMiha wrote:
| Would you actually be willing to bet money on this 1 to
| 1? I. e. that Holmes serves no days in prison.
| hnarayanan wrote:
| I totally would. She's a blonde haired, blue-eyed white
| woman!
| KumoriNova wrote:
| "She's a blonde haired, blue-eyed white woman!"
|
| What does that mean to you? I am curious to know why
| you'd make that bet with the OP with those two facts
| alone.
| wombat-man wrote:
| I guess I understand the cynicism but her net worth
| appears to be not much. Usually you'd want to use your
| money to avoid getting convicted but here we are.
|
| It's non-violent. Nobody died. I think 5-10 years. Maybe
| she can be Shkreli's pen pal.
| himinlomax wrote:
| > It's non-violent. Nobody died.
|
| She was peddling non functional healthcare devices and
| services. People could have died, and she clearly didn't
| care.
| wombat-man wrote:
| Wasn't it mostly vapor ware medical testing services?
| Afaik they mainly wasted investor time and money and took
| customer money for test services they just never ended up
| providing. Unless I'm missing something??
|
| I think their customers just ended up stuck with the bill
| and had to go to a regular lab.
| pb7 wrote:
| Wrong. Someone committed suicide because of her and her
| legal team's harassment and blackmailing.
| ck2 wrote:
| This was a theranos pricing sheet
|
| https://i.imgur.com/ukWZMDn.png
|
| If only it was reality and we might never have that pricing
|
| Compare to labtestingapi.com which is the cheapest quest
| reseller, $20 vitamin D test vs $52
|
| https://www.labtestingapi.com/product/questassured-25-hydrox...
|
| $10 B12 vs $39, etc.
|
| The biggest crime she committed was ending any chance at a
| startup with affordable pricing in the future, no-one would
| believe/invest so now we are back to a duopoly in the USA (quest
| vs labcorp)
|
| Maybe in a decade, or two, we'll have our own mini-lab in a box
| in our homes for outselves and pets, maybe it will be on a
| subscription pay-per-month software model, maybe 100 years we'll
| have it on our phones like a tricorder.
| Overtonwindow wrote:
| I'm genuinely surprised. I thought after seven days it would be
| deadlocked on everything, particularly being silicon valley,
| successful, beautiful woman, I just didn't have a lot of faith in
| the jury. I guess this is a very mixed verdict.
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