Theranos Founder Elizabeth Holmes Is A Corporate Gangster

Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes, who promised to revolutionize blood testing, has been charged by the SEC with a "massive fraud" involving more than $700 million.

Former president Ramesh "Sunny" Balwani was also charged. The two raised money from investors "through an elaborate, years-long fraud in which they exaggerated or made false statements about the company's technology, business, and financial performance," the SEC said Wednesday.

Theranos and Holmes agreed to resolve the claims against them, the SEC said. Holmes will give up control of the company and much of her stake in it. The SEC said it would take its case against Balwani to federal court in San Francisco.

Theranos is a Silicon Valley startup once valued at as much as $9 billion. It was formed in 2003 by then 19-year-old Elizabeth Holmes, who dropped out of Stanford University to launch the company. It was considered an industry disruptor that aimed to create cheaper, more efficient alternatives to traditional medical tests.

But it's been rattled by controversy following a 2015 Wall Street Journal report that questioned its technology and testing methods. The company has since voided two years of blood tests, faced federal probes and pivoted away from blood testing.

Elizabeth Holmes declined to comment through her attorney.

Jeffrey B. Coopersmith, a partner at Davis Wright Tremaine who represents Balwani, called the SEC action against his client "unwarranted."

"Sunny Balwani accurately represented Theranos to investors to the best of his ability," Coopersmith said in a statement.

Coopersmith said Balwani invested millions of his own dollars into Theranos and "never benefited financially from his work at the company."

Theranos' independent directors issued a statement, saying "the company is pleased to be bringing this matter to a close and looks forward to advancing its technology."

According to the complaint against Theranos and Holmes, she and Balwani knew that its proprietary analyzer could perform only 12 of the 200 tests it published on its patient testing menu, something the Wall Street Journal hinted at in its first expose on the company.

MY OP ED: This corporate gangster like every other corporate gangster was not even arrested. This sort of criminality in corporate America and in the medical industry especially is the rule and not the exception. 

LOCK HER UP!

The filthy rich in America are above the law.