Elizabeth Holmes ordered to pay massive restitution over fraud.
[Mercury News] Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes and her co-accused [and now also convicted] and former lover Sunny Balwani were ordered late Tuesday to pay more than $450 million in restitution for defrauding investors.
Holmes, the founder and former CEO of the now-defunct Palo Alto, California, blood testing startup, has said in court filings that she “continues to work on ideas for patents” but “has essentially no assets of meaningful value” and “has incurred substantial debt from which she is unlikely to recover.”
In his restitution order, Judge Edward Davila, who presided over the trials and convictions of Holmes and Balwani, held the two “jointly and severally liable” for the nearly half-billion-dollar repayment to individuals and entities, because they were both found guilty of conspiring with each other to defraud investors. That means Holmes and Balwani — the former Theranos president who has denied Holmes’ claims he sexually abused and coerced her — are each on the hook for the full amount, but if one pays, they can seek a contribution from the other...
I first learned the concept of "joint and severable liability" in 1986 during my tenure as a programmer and QC analyst in a forensic-level environmental radioanalytical lab in Oak Ridge. Much of our work resulted in evidence used in radiation contamination and/or exposure liability litigation and regulatory actions. Basically if you were found to have 1% "liability" but you had 99% of the attachable liquid assets, well, guess what?
Elizabeth Holmes is going to federal prison (11 yrs). Neither she nor Sunny Balwani (now in the Joint for 13 yrs) is ever likely to pay diddley in restitution.
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