Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes seeks new trial claiming key witness regrets original testimony

Elizabeth Holmes, the Theranos founder convicted of fraud earlier this year, has asked for a new trial just weeks before she is set to be sentenced.

In a Tuesday court filing, Ms Holmes stated that former Theranos lab director Adam Rosendorff, a key witness in her initial trial, visited her home on August 8 and told her partner that prosecutors had twisted his testimony.

“Under any interpretation of his statements, the statements warrant a new trial,” one of Ms Holmes’ lawyers wrote in the filing, noting that the government considered Mr Rosendorff a “star witness.”

The request for a new trial comes some eight months after Ms Holmes was found guilty of conspiracy and defrauding Theranos investors for her role in the collapse of the blood testing company she founded after dropping out of Stanford University in 2003.

Theranos aimed to perform a wide range of blood tests with just a small amount of blood, an idea that promised to reshape the healthcare landscape. Theranos partnered with Walgreens to launch blood sample centers in Walgreens stores in 2013, and by the next year, Theranos was valued a $9bn — making Ms Holmes one of the world’s youngest female billionaires.

Shortly thereafter, however, it was reported that Theranos’ technology did not work as advertised and that Ms Holmes had misrepresented the company’s technology and financial standing.

Ms Holmes was found guilty in January of three counts of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. She faces up to 20 years in prison and a fine of $250,000 for each count of fraud. Ms Holmes’ business partner and ex-romantic partner Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani was also convicted of fraud earlier this year.

Now, with her sentencing scheduled for October 17, Ms Holmes is attempting to have her convictions thrown out. According to the filing, Mr Rosendroff told Ms Holmes’ partner Billy Evans that “he tried to answer the questions honestly at Ms. Holmes’ trial, but the government tried to make everyone look bad.”

Mr Rosendroff’s testified at Ms Holmes’ trial that he alerted Ms Holmes to issues in the Theranos lab and faced an intense, days-long cross-examination from Ms Holmes’ attorneys who noted that Mr Rosendroff worked in several other labs that had regulatory issues.

Notably, Mr Rosendroff was also a source for the Wall Street Journal article that precipitated Theranos’ demise in October of 2015.

Ms Holmes lawyers have requested that if it is not willing to grant a new trial immediately, the court “should order an evidentiary hearing and permit Ms. Holmes to subpoena Dr. Rosendorff to testify about his concerns.”