Finally.
Now they can both be sentenced.
September 26th for Holmes. November 15th for Bulwani.
Finally.
I concur with the results. I always suspected that he was in control of the fraudulent test results, and she not as much.
Next up, the sentencing.
Ah. Y’know, it couldn’t have happened to a nicer controlling, arrogant jerk.
Based on what evidence, exactly? Multiple people have testified that Elizabeth Holmes knew about and directed the fraudulent results, presented false information to investigators and regulators, and gaslighted employees when they brought issues with both the fundamental development problems with the Edison testing machine and the test results. She was CEO of a company that aggressively pursued both Tyler Schulz and Erika Cheung with threats of legal action which is legal action she should have known about and likely directed.
Holmes avoided full culpability for her actions by hinging off of the #MeToo sentiment and making claims of sexual abuse and assault by Bulwani that were not in any way substantiated—not even by prior statements to other people—and even if true do not in any way excuse responsibility for her actions as CEO and chief promoter of Theranos. By dint of her charisma and sociopathy, she managed to convince a jury that she was innocent of the majority of the charges save for conspiring to commit all of the crimes that Bulwani was found guilty of committing which the kind of logical non sequitur that her lawyers were hoping for when they severed the trial from that of Bulwani.
She’s as much of a manipulative, sociopathic predator as Bulwani and both of them should be spending decades in prison for recklessly placing the health and well-being of patients in jeopardy. Instead, it is likely that she’ll get a 2-3 years of minimum security prison potentially down-graded to house arrest courtesy of the child she produced while under indictment likely for that purpose.
Stranger
Yeah, not a fan of her either. The same Federal judge will be sentencing both of them - I doubt he’ll be that easy on her.
I based what I said on the podcasts I listened to.
Try reading instead.
Stranger
Yup, pretty good book - and the author is a character in the miniseries The Dropout.
So, what are the lightest and heaviest sentences these two characters could get? Not what they are likely to get, but what ranges are they facing?
From a CNN article:
https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/08/tech/elizabeth-holmes-sunny-balwani-theranos-sentencing/index.html
Holmes and Balwani each face up to 20 years in prison as well as a fine of $250,000 plus restitution per count.
If these are concurrent sentences and nobody ever gets the maximum, is it likely that the actual prison time will be less than 10 years total for each defendant? With good behavior and time already served, could both the people be out in 5 or so years?
For the legal types, why are sentences often concurrent when the charges are separate, even if it’s the same crime? For example, convicted of 4 fraud charges, but the jail term will be the same as being convicted of one charge.
Also, do these kind of crimes ever have to make full restitution for all the money they scammed people out of, and how do they get them to pay? Is it a lump sum or do they pay x dollars a month until it’s paid off? This company was worth $9 billion dollars at one point. Who is going to get their investment money back? Was this a public company with shareholders? Will they get any money back?
Because if the legislature has concluded that the appropriate sentence is say 5 years for a particular crime, serving multiple sentences consecutively could mean that the person is in jail for much longer than 5 years. If they’re convicted of five counts, and they’re served consecutively, the accused could be in jail for over 20 years.
That’s not what the legislature has concluded is an appropriate sentence for the crime. Concurrent sentences are the general approach. Consecutive sentences would drastically increase the amount of time being served and many accused could start looking at an effective life sentence, even though the legislature has said the sentence is much less than that.
Judges have discretion to make sentences consecutive, but it’s not used very often.
(All the above comments are from the perspective of the Canadian system; not sure how far it translates to the US, with the federal and 50 state systems .)
This explanation is generally true in US as well.
Good, glad I was helpful. Thanks.
I knew you guys would help out. Thanks.
What I was getting at is really if sentences are generally concurrent, why bring 4 charges of fraud if one charge will result in the same sentence?
If you prosecuted one charge and the defendant was found innocent, could you still prosecute on one of the remaining three charges?
Yes, I think it makes it that much harder for the conviction to be over-turned on appeal.
But I agree that if someone was caught selling drugs to one person, or to 4, I don’t think they should be serving drastically different sentences.
I don’t see why that would be. Either you have a good case or you don’t, no matter how many charges you bring.
Do dealers ever get charged like that? Distributers maybe, but regular street dealers?
Because the sentence is just part of the issue. If the police uncover evidence that supports several charges, then it’s important to bring those charges to court. It is significant both for the public and the victims of crimes to see that the police and prosecution services take any potential crime seriously, if the evidence supports a charge and going to trial.
Don’t know exactly how it works in the States, but in Canada, if the Crown knows of evidence of a charge and delays bringing it, that could be seen as breaching the right to a trial within a reasonable time. It may also trigger applications for stays based on bad faith.