Keystone
In a few weeks, the process of what is probably the most spectacular suspected fraud in recent tech history will begin. The main character Elizabeth Holmes has long been the subject of Hollywood. Your lawyers want the jurors not to notice.
The Elizabeth Holmes saga could not have been written better by the best playwrights. From America’s richest self-made woman to penniless defendant. From “female Steve Jobs” to presumably the greatest fraudster in Silicon Valley history.
Elizabeth Holmes and her company Theranos promised a revolutionary product, the “Edison”. A medical device that, with just a few drops of blood from the fingertip, can carry out on-the-spot examinations for a variety of diseases – examinations that previously required several tubes filled with blood and a well-equipped laboratory.
However, Holmes is said to have quickly realized that the “Edison” did not work, never worked and would never have worked. Investors and customers have been systematically deceived over the years. In 2018 she was charged because of this, after delays caused by Corona and Holmes’ pregnancy, the trial is now set to begin in August.
Too perfect to be true
Elizabeth Holmes’ career seemed too perfect to be true – and it was. As a 20-year-old Stanford dropout, she founded Theranos, and she cultivated her image as a young tech genius to perfection.
In public appearances, she often wore a disdainful turtleneck sweater and wanted to create an association with Apple founder Steve Jobs, who wore the same style of clothing. It made the covers of glossy magazines.
This charisma helped her garner millions of prominent investors in the male-dominated tech world over the years. Media mogul Rupert Murdoch, Donald Trump’s education minister Betsy DeVos and the owner family of the supermarket chain Walmart put more than 100 million dollars in the Californian sands through their Theranos investment.
Despite many inconsistencies in retrospect, the decline did not begin until the end of 2015, with a series of revelatory articles in the Wall Street Journal. Little by little, the house of cards Theranos began to collapse, and in 2018 the company went bankrupt.
A case for pop culture
The story has long gone down in pop culture. In addition to a bestselling non-fiction book, there is already a podcast series and an HBO documentation. If that’s not enough drama for you, you can look forward to a film starring Jennifer Lawrence and a TV series starring Amanda Seyfried, both of which are currently in development.
However, Holmes lawyers apparently want the jurors not to have noticed anything. In their proposal for a 45-page catalog of questions, they want to know from potential jury members whether they each consume one of 65 media or use social media services. If so, please list in detail what you have posted about in your life.
The public prosecutor’s office has already filed an objection to the catalog of questions and the judge is unlikely to accept it. In San Francisco, where the trial will take place, it will simply be impossible to find jurors who have not already heard a lot about Theranos or Holmes.
It could soon be the same in the rest of the world.
On weekdays at 11:30 am and sometimes not until 12 noon there is a regular midday column on “blue News” – it revolves around well-known personalities, sometimes also unknown ones – and sometimes there will also be an asterisk.
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