Disgraced Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes' trial could be delayed by pregnancy
The alleged Theranos fraudster Elizabeth Holmes is pregnant, according to a new court filing, potentially delaying her trial by several weeks.
Holmes is being charged with fraud for her role at the helm of Theranos, a blood-testing startup that was a rising star in Silicon Valley before it emerged it had misrepresented the effectiveness of its technology.
Lawyers for Holmes asked the judge on 2 March to delay the start of jury selection to 31 August, after her due date.
“The parties have met and conferred, and both parties agree that, in light of this development, it is not feasible to begin the trial on July 13, 2021, as currently scheduled,” said the filing.
Holmes, who famously dropped out of Stanford at 19, founded Theranos in 2003 with the goal of revolutionizing blood testing. She quickly became a star in the startup space that is largely dominated by men.
The company’s rise and fall became a cautionary tale about the pitfalls of the Silicon Valley hype machine: it received glowing media coverage and raised more than $700m from investors on claims it had invented a machine that could conduct hundreds of laboratory tests from a single finger-prick of blood. The tests were rolled out in Walgreens stores and Theranos reached a $9bn valuation before it became clear that many of the claims about the company’s supposedly revolutionary blood test were bogus.
Holmes and the former Theranos president Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani have pleaded not guilty to charges they defrauded investors, doctors and patients. Theranos’ tests for calcium, potassium, HIV and diabetes, for example, misrepresented their efficacy.
“Based on these representations, many hundreds of patients paid or caused their medical insurance companies to pay Theranos for blood tests and test results, sometimes following referrals from their defrauded doctors,” the initial indictment stated.
Holmes was indicted in 2018 and her federal trial in San Jose, California, was originally scheduled for 28 July 2020 but was postponed because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Balwani’s case is being handled separately and his trial is scheduled to begin 18 January.
The Silicon Valley saga has inspired a bestselling book, a popular podcast, several documentaries and a feature film.
Gunmen have raided a college in northwest Nigeria and kidnapped 39 students, in the latest mass abduction targeting a school.
The gang stormed the Federal College of Forestry Mechanisation in Mando, Kaduna state, at about 9.30pm (2030 GMT) on Thursday, shooting indiscriminately before taking students. The Kaduna college was said to have about 300 male and female students – mostly aged 17 and older – at the time of the attack.
Kaduna state commissioner for internal security, Samuel Aruwan, said 39 of the students were missing while the army was able to rescue 180 people after a battle with the gunmen. “Further checks in the wake of the attack by armed bandits … indicate that 39 students are currently unaccounted for,” including 23 females and 16 males, Aruwan said in a statement late on Friday.
He had initially said 30 students were unaccounted for.
Aruwan said the state government “is maintaining close communication with the management of the college as efforts are sustained by security agencies towards the tracking of the missing students”.
The commissioner said some of the rescued students were injured during the operation and were being treated at a military hospital.
Police and military personnel stood guard around the college on the outskirts of Kaduna city on Friday afternoon as anxious parents and families waited for news. A fighter jet flew overhead.
“We have confirmed from her colleagues our daughter Sera is with the abductors,” Helen Sunday told reporters, tears rolling down her face. “I appeal to the government to help rescue our children.”
Heavily armed gangs in north-west and central Nigeria have stepped up attacks in recent years, kidnapping for ransom, raping and pillaging. The bandits have recently turned their focus to schools where they kidnap students or schoolchildren for ransom. Thursday’s raid was at least the fourth such attack since December.
Mass kidnappings in the north-west are complicating security challenges facing President Muhammadu Buhari’s security forces who are also battling a more than decade-long Islamist insurgency in the north-east.
The area is notorious for banditry and armed robbery, especially along the highway linking the city with the airport. The gangs are largely driven by financial motives and have no known ideological leanings. Victims are often released shortly after negotiations though officials always deny any ransom payments.
On 27 February, gunmen abducted 279 schoolgirls in nearby Zamfara state. And a week earlier, gunmen seized 42 people, including 27 students from an all-boys boarding school in central Niger state. In December, hundreds of schoolboys were seized in Katsina, Buhari’s home state, while he was on a visit.