Congratulations to Elizabeth Holmes! The founder of Theranos, the scandal-plagued blood-testing start-up that had briefly made her a billionaire before the company spectacularly crashed and burned, had a baby in July, pushing her trial for fraud to August 31.
Some would question the decision to start a family when you are facing many years in prison for 9 counts of wire fraud and 2 counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, but others see it as a smart move to avoid imprisonment.
From CNBC:
The news of Holmes' pregnancy raised questions about how that would affect her trial.
"Being a new mother can only help get her sympathy from jurors," NBC news Legal Analyst Danny Cevallos, said. "If convicted, even if her sentencing guidelines call for incarceration, her attorneys will place her motherhood front and central before the judge."
In an interview with CNBC last month, John Carreyrou, the former Wall Street Journal reporter who broke the Theranos scandal, said he spoke to people tied to the case and some "think that she was timing her pregnancy in order to be showing during the trial to get the jury sympathies."
"If Elizabeth is convicted and the case goes to the judge for sentencing, if he sends her to prison for a long time he'd be depriving the child of his or her mother for many years," Carreyrou said. "And that's a heavy decision to make."
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