SAN JOSE, Calif. (NewsNation Now) — A jury has found Elizabeth Holmes guilty of four charges, including conspiracy, at her former blood-testing startup Theranos.
The former CEO was also found guilty of three counts of wire fraud against an investor.
Holmes, who had bowed her head several times before the jury was polled by the judge, remained seated and expressed no visible emotion as the verdicts were read. Her partner, Billy Evans, showed agitation in earlier moments but appeared calm during the verdict reading.
She had faced 11 possible criminal counts. The jury found her not guilty of four other felony charges related to defrauding patients. On the three remaining charges about defrauding investors, the jury was deadlocked.
“The jury could not get to the point where they thought that Ms. Holmes was deliberately misleading the patients, deliberately defrauding the patients, but they did get to the point where she was defrauding and in a conspiracy to defraud investors,” legal analyst Rachel Fiset said on “NewsNation Prime” on Monday.
She now faces up to 20 years behind bars per guilty verdict, and fines could reach $145 million, but Fiset said it’s likely the prison time would be served concurrently.
After the judge left the courtroom to meet with jurors individually, Holmes got up to hug Evans and her parents before leaving with her lawyers.
Prosecutors said Holmes, 37, swindled private investors from 2010 to 2015 by convincing them that Theranos’ small machines could run a range of tests with a few drops of blood from a finger prick.
Testifying in her own defense at trial, Holmes said she never meant to deceive anyone and that Theranos’ lab directors were in charge of test quality. In closing arguments, defense attorney Kevin Downey said the evidence did not show Holmes was motivated by a cash crunch at Theranos, but rather thought she was “building a technology that would change the world.”
“You know that at the first sign of trouble, crooks cash out,” but Holmes stayed, Downey said. “She went down with that ship when it went down.”
Holmes rose to Silicon Valley fame after founding Theranos in 2003.
Wealthy private investors including media mogul Rupert Murdoch invested millions in the company after meeting with the founder, who was known for her Steve Jobs-like black turtleneck.
The case has shed light on Theranos’ failed endeavor to revolutionize lab testing. The company secretly relied on conventional machines manufactured by Siemens to run patients’ tests, prosecutors said.
Theranos collapsed after The Wall Street Journal published a series of articles that suggested its devices were flawed and inaccurate. Holmes was indicted in 2018 alongside Theranos’ former chief operating officer, Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani.
Balwani will be tried at a later date. He has pleaded not guilty.