Davila had previously recommended that Holmes serve her time at a federal prison camp in Bryan, Texas, about 100 miles outside of Houston.
Holmes’s downfall has been used as an allegory of the apparent “growth at all costs” mind-set within the tech community, even as its members have sought to cast Holmes and Theranos as outliers.
Holmes founded Theranos in 2003 while a student at Stanford University. She later dropped out, pouring her energy into the blood-testing start-up and adopting a persona that included black turtle necks reminiscent of Apple founder Steve Jobs. Celebrated as a symbol of a successful female entrepreneur, Holmes’s net worth peaked at an estimated $4.5 billion in 2015.
But her reputation began to unravel more than six years ago when a Wall Street Journal investigation revealed a dysfunctional workplace and cast serious doubt on the company’s claims that it could run a multitude of tests from just a couple drops of blood. Theranos shuttered in 2018 amid multiple regulatory and media investigations, and Holmes was charged in 2018 with wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud.
Holmes was convicted in January 2022 on four counts of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud against investors. In a separate but similar trial, Holmes’s former business and romantic partner, Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani, was found guilty of 12 counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and wire fraud. He began serving a 13-year sentence April 20 at a federal correctional institute in San Pedro, Calif.
Shortly after Holmes’s conviction, prosecutors alleged that Holmes had attempted to flee the country after she bought a ticket to Mexico.
