Government prosecutors learned of the plane — which took off on Jan. 1. January 26, 2022 on the 23rd of that year and notified Holmes’ legal team via email. They replied that she had booked a flight ahead of the sentencing in the hope that she would be able to attend the wedding in Mexico. Holmes canceled the ticket, “but it is difficult to determine what the defendant would have done if the government had not intervened,” prosecutors wrote.
The application is in response to a motion filed by Holmes, 38, to ease restrictions on areas where she can travel. To do so, Holmes had to prove that she was no flight risk, a requirement prosecutors said she failed to meet.
In November last year, Holmes was sentenced to more than 11 years in prison on January 1. On February 3, 2022, pleaded guilty to four counts of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud. She was sentenced to surrender on April 27 this year after a court found she was pregnant with her second child.
According to prosecutors’ documents, Holmes posted a $500,000 bond secured by her parents’ house, and she has been living on a California estate that reportedly costs more than $13,000 a month in maintenance.
Prosecutors’ documents say she justified her request for extended travel based on her partner’s work commitments, and that his salary was also recorded as $0 despite claiming that “her partner and not she pays the monthly bills.”
Her attorneys argued in their motion that Holmes “has a close relationship with her partner and family, including her son and imminent child, which prompted her to comply with the conditions of her release.”
in the January email. On February 23, 2022, Justice Department attorney Jeffrey Schenk wrote to Holmes’ attorneys saying the government was aware of her travel plans but that she had not received court approval. “Given her current bail conditions, we are concerned,” he wrote, asking for confirmation of the trip cancellation the next morning.
Holmes’ lawyer replied, “In light of the judgment, she does not intend to travel,” noting that her passport had been confiscated. She didn’t cancel the flight “out of all the things that happened”, he said, adding they would “make her do so as soon as possible”.
Court documents say Holmes’ partner, William Evans, did eventually go to Mexico and returned to the United States from South Africa more than five weeks later.
In 2003, at the age of 19, Holmes founded lab-testing startup Theranos, promising technology that could perform hundreds of medical tests using just a few drops of blood. The company has attracted hundreds of millions of dollars from prominent investors including Rupert Murdoch and Walmart’s Walton Family. Former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis is on the board.
In 2015, Holmes had a net worth of $4.5 billion, according to Reuters. As a young up-and-coming CEO, she graced the covers of magazines such as Forbes and Fortune.
But her image began to crumble after revelations from a Wall Street Journal investigation, including how Theranos relied on technology from other companies for its testing. In the end, it turned out that Holmes led the The Thursday filing called it “an elaborate fraudulent scheme that resulted in losses of more than $100 million, with no regard for the patients she endangered, and with no remorse for investor victims to date.”
The prosecutor added: “There are not two justice systems – one for the rich and one for the poor – there is only one criminal justice system in this country.”