Disgraced former Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes is pushing back against an accusation from federal prosecutors that she tried to flee the country after her conviction was handed down, according to The Daily Beast on Monday.
"In a court filing on Monday, the defense lawyers asked the court to strike inaccuracies from the record, including the 'baseless' allegation that she tried to hightail it to Mexico on a one-way ticket," reported Noah Kirsh. "Prosecutors 'recklessly and incorrectly accuse Ms. Holmes and her partner [Billy Evans] of attempted flight and present incomplete and provably inaccurate statements of fact in support of that accusation,' the filing said. The government had raised the issue while challenging Holmes’ request to stay out of prison pending her appeal."
"The truth of the matter, Holmes’ lawyers wrote, was that Evans purchased the tickets in December 2021, 'before the verdict,' and in the hopes that Holmes would soon be acquitted," said the report. "When that didn’t happen, he failed to quickly cancel the reservation, but Holmes’ attorneys argued that 'there was no way for her to go' anyway since she didn’t have access to her passport (which had expired) and did not seek court approval to travel abroad."
The original allegation from prosecutors was first reported last week.
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"Holmes’ attorneys argued that the flight risk claims distort her 'flawless pretrial services record,'" the report continued. "Furthermore, they refuted prosecutors’ allegation that Evans left the country on a one-way ticket last January and 'and did not return until approximately six weeks later… from a different continent.' In fact, Evans and the lawyers said, he returned to the U.S. from Mexico four days after departing."
Holmes rose to prominence on the promise that her company would develop blood testing equipment that could screen for hundreds of different conditions from a single pinprick of blood — something she knew the technology didn't exist for. Under her direction Theranos defrauded investors and patients alike, by running tests on machines that could not function, and sometimes falsely passing off traditional lab tests as having been done on Theranos equipment.