Elizabeth Holmes found guilty • Hacker News Board

Re: Elizabeth Holmes found guilty

#611

Post by azernik » Tue, Jan 04, 2022, 9:41 AM UTC

nikanj wrote: post #594

runeks wrote: post #544

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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”.

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…

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.

Re: Elizabeth Holmes found guilty

#612

Post by pdpi » Tue, Jan 04, 2022, 9:43 AM UTC

jonwachob91 wrote: post #40

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, the…

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.

Re: Elizabeth Holmes found guilty

#613

Post by azernik » Tue, Jan 04, 2022, 9:44 AM UTC

mdoms wrote: post #340

metadat wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hopefully she'll get more, SV could use a good example. Otherwise it signals that wantrepeneurs can keep doing it with minimal repercussions.

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?

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.

Re: Elizabeth Holmes found guilty

#614

Post by codeflo » Tue, Jan 04, 2022, 9:46 AM UTC

afterburner wrote: post #596

causality0 wrote: post #587

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"?

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?

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.

Re: Elizabeth Holmes found guilty

#615

Post by thegreatdukd » Tue, Jan 04, 2022, 9:47 AM UTC

droidno9 wrote: post #521

tptacek wrote: post #78

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 s…

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.

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.

Re: Elizabeth Holmes found guilty

#616

Post by jaynetics » Tue, Jan 04, 2022, 9:48 AM UTC

mehrshad wrote: post #459

sharkweek wrote: post #25

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 fe…

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…

"Risk more than others think is wise", well, you have to admit they followed through on that wall tattoo.

Re: Elizabeth Holmes found guilty

#617

Post by jaynetics » Tue, Jan 04, 2022, 9:49 AM UTC

thechao wrote: post #246

sharkweek wrote: post #25

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 fe…

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 .

> my Orwellian yellow plastic “Great Place To Work” Intel tamborine

That sounds hilarious, can you post a picture?

Re: Elizabeth Holmes found guilty

#618

Post by Nasrudith » Tue, Jan 04, 2022, 9:52 AM UTC

starfallg wrote: post #579

Someone wrote: post #574

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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/Eliza…

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.

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.

Re: Elizabeth Holmes found guilty

#619

Post by peter_retief » Tue, Jan 04, 2022, 9:52 AM UTC

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!

Re: Elizabeth Holmes found guilty

#620

Post by rtpg » Tue, Jan 04, 2022, 9:52 AM UTC

VWWHFSfQ wrote: post #608

causality0 wrote: post #587

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"?

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 ki…

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)