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Theranos exec Sunny Balwani sentenced to 13 years in prison

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Re: Theranos exec Sunny Balwani sentenced to 13 years in prison

#51

Post by ineedasername »

highwaylights wrote: post #35
icedchai wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read the book and also agree with this. She was the CEO, but he "ran" the company. He also put millions of his own money into it to keep it afloat. He should've been the "adult supervision", so to speak.

I've seen a lot of excuses from CEO's for why they aren't responsible for their actions but "I didn't have adult supervision" takes the cake.

Eh, Holmes was 19 when she dropped out of colleges. Despite legal adulthood, people are disproportionately stupid and/or naive at that age. It by no means excuses what she did and I think her sentence was at least reasonable and perhaps too lenient. But I think age and the lack of more experienced people with level heads around her is 1) a slight mitigating circumstance and 2) partly her own fault.

In short, adult supervision should at least be a consideration. Had she be 17 at the start, a difference of a mere two years, that might seem more clear (to some). Legal adulthood at 18 doesn’t confer some magical maturity and wisdom so we shouldn’t regard it much differently than 25-27.

To preempt arguments that this went on without Sunny for some years after she turned 19: 1) Plenty of people with some experience and maturity could have been in her circle of influence before then and 2) I did say age was only a slight mitigating circumstance.

Re: Theranos exec Sunny Balwani sentenced to 13 years in prison

#52

Post by ineedasername »

ffggvv wrote: post #33
dmix wrote: post #3

I'm happy he got even more than Holmes (11 vs 13). The book made him sound worse than she was and he was the mastermind internally at keeping the staff working and building a culture of misdirection and obedience. He was firing people on an almost daily basis for a while whenever someone questioned their bullshit. Holmes was the showpiece, who got to play the pretend female Steve Jobs visionary role to the press and…

shocked a brown male got a worse sentence than a white female for the same crime

They were charged for different crimes and had slightly different roles in perpetuating the fraud within & without the company. Whether or not young white females get more leniency isn’t even quite the issue: That assumes they might get less than deserved. That is a separate questions from whether or not a brown male got more than deserved. The questions may even have some overlap in a Venn diagram but they are not correlated 1:1.

Re: Theranos exec Sunny Balwani sentenced to 13 years in prison

#53

Post by lupire »

dmix wrote: post #44
fasthands9 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. She was the CEO and ultimately had the most control. She also did the most lying to investors. We don't know what SBF will be charged with yet - but how would we feel if one of the other employees who did more of the actual transfers/faulty accounting got more of a sentence? As long as it clear that the CEO (in this case SBF) knew about the wrongdoing I think it is fair to hold them to the harshest senten…

> but how would we feel if one of the other employees who did more of the actual transfers/faulty accounting got more of a sentence Sunny wasn't just one of the employees, he was essentially a cofounder and was Elizabeth's closest advisor. The book made it sound like he ran the actual company while she was distracted with the media and having dinners with politicians. Re: SBF, he owned 90% of Alameda and was responsi…

> she was distracted with the media and having dinners with politicians.

She wasn't distracted, she was the distraction, the pretty young pretend-genius (with no college degree), white blonde lady in her Steve Jobs costume.

Do you think Sunny would have gotten all those investments from old military guys?

Re: Theranos exec Sunny Balwani sentenced to 13 years in prison

#54

Post by Alupis »

ubermonkey wrote: post #50
dylan604 wrote: post #24

If you were someone that was a defendant in a case like this where another case finished before you that ended in prison sentence, the natural assumption would be yours is heading the same way. The psychology of that must be intense. If you're the type that accepted that fate, you can start making proper plans for your incarceration too. But these are people that scammed others, so I would assume not the type to acce…

Both almost certainly surrendered their passports at initial arrest. The time to have fled was before that point.

I think it would be safe to assume people in this high-flying financial orbit would have access to the sorts of people that could get them out of the country without a passport.

Re: Theranos exec Sunny Balwani sentenced to 13 years in prison

#55

Post by lupire »

fasthands9 wrote: post #46
dmix wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but how would we feel if one of the other employees who did more of the actual transfers/faulty accounting got more of a sentence Sunny wasn't just one of the employees, he was essentially a cofounder and was Elizabeth's closest advisor. The book made it sound like he ran the actual company while she was distracted with the media and having dinners with politicians. Re: SBF, he owned 90% of Alameda and was responsi…

I'm not saying he was a random employee but he was definitely lower on the totem poll. Holmes could have had him removed from the company at any time. The same is not true of Sunny removing Holmes. I have also read the book and agree Holmes was more into the PR stuff and investor stuff. But again - the crimes had to do with lying to investors.

She was convicted of the investor crimes, and he was convicted of the operations crimes.

Re: Theranos exec Sunny Balwani sentenced to 13 years in prison

#56

Post by notch656a »

Alupis wrote: post #54
ubermonkey wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both almost certainly surrendered their passports at initial arrest. The time to have fled was before that point.

I think it would be safe to assume people in this high-flying financial orbit would have access to the sorts of people that could get them out of the country without a passport.

I've never had CBP check my passport when walking into Mexico. And Mexican officials are always asleep or absent when I pass through their side. No matter, all they require to enter Mexico is a US Birth Certificate (but they don't ask) lol. People leaving by private boat or plane are basically on a trust system; how the hell would they know if you're flying to Hawaii or not if headed to the Pacific, or whether you're going somewhere foreign or to Puerto Rico or the USVI if you're sailing into the Caribbean?

I'm pretty sure there's thousands a day that walk into Mexico everyday without a passport. Hell half the people in line returning to the US claim they "forgot" theirs.

Leaving is easy without a passport. And don't forgot if Sunny can get to the shores of Pakistan, he is a citizen and they must let him in, after which he can easily hide in the tribal areas. All he would need is a yacht somewhere on the multi-thousands of miles on the coastline and some friendly boats in int'l waters to refuel him.

Re: Theranos exec Sunny Balwani sentenced to 13 years in prison

#57

Post by lupire »

ffggvv wrote: post #33
dmix wrote: post #3

I'm happy he got even more than Holmes (11 vs 13). The book made him sound worse than she was and he was the mastermind internally at keeping the staff working and building a culture of misdirection and obedience. He was firing people on an almost daily basis for a while whenever someone questioned their bullshit. Holmes was the showpiece, who got to play the pretend female Steve Jobs visionary role to the press and…

shocked a brown male got a worse sentence than a white female for the same crime

Brown male... with 2 more degrees and decades of experience in business, who did the criminal operations.

Re: Theranos exec Sunny Balwani sentenced to 13 years in prison

#58

Post by skinnymuch »

ubermonkey wrote: post #50
dylan604 wrote: post #24

If you were someone that was a defendant in a case like this where another case finished before you that ended in prison sentence, the natural assumption would be yours is heading the same way. The psychology of that must be intense. If you're the type that accepted that fate, you can start making proper plans for your incarceration too. But these are people that scammed others, so I would assume not the type to acce…

Both almost certainly surrendered their passports at initial arrest. The time to have fled was before that point.

How much worse is it to flee now vs before? It’s not clear if Sunny is still 8 figure wealthy or not but it appears he is for now.

Re: Theranos exec Sunny Balwani sentenced to 13 years in prison

#59

Post by fasthands9 »

lupire wrote: post #55
fasthands9 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not saying he was a random employee but he was definitely lower on the totem poll. Holmes could have had him removed from the company at any time. The same is not true of Sunny removing Holmes. I have also read the book and agree Holmes was more into the PR stuff and investor stuff. But again - the crimes had to do with lying to investors.

She was convicted of the investor crimes, and he was convicted of the operations crimes.

>Following a three-month trial and deliberations over five days that ended in July, Balwani's jury returned guilty verdicts on all 12 charges brought by the Justice Department — seven counts of wire fraud for defrauding Theranos investors, two counts of wire fraud for defrauding paying patients, two counts for conspiring to defraud investors and patients, and one count for wire fraud related to Theranos advertisements to patients in Arizona.

I dont know the exact breakdown but seems like most of his crimes still had to do with defrauding investors. What distinction do you mean by "operations crimes"?

Re: Theranos exec Sunny Balwani sentenced to 13 years in prison

#60

Post by lupire »

bitwize wrote: post #32
dmix wrote: post #3

I'm happy he got even more than Holmes (11 vs 13). The book made him sound worse than she was and he was the mastermind internally at keeping the staff working and building a culture of misdirection and obedience. He was firing people on an almost daily basis for a while whenever someone questioned their bullshit. Holmes was the showpiece, who got to play the pretend female Steve Jobs visionary role to the press and…

I think Holmes played a bigger role in the fraud than people give her credit for, whether she "meant to" defraud people or not, I don't think she was like "I'm gonna deceive all these people" but rather "I need to keep the money flowing so that I can develop the technology to make this a reality". That said, of the two of them, Balwani was the true gangsta. He came in seemingly already knowing how to run a criminal e…

Holmes never and inkling of a plan to make the tech a reality. She was just a figurehead for a scam, the ICO of its day.
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