Federal prosecutors will be allowed to highlight Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes’ taste for globe-trotting and celebrity in her upcoming fraud trial, a judge ruled, after her attorneys argued that such details could enflame jurors’ “class prejudice.”
Holmes’ glamorous lifestyle included traveling by private jet, driving an expensive SUV and staying in pricey hotels while hobnobbing with influential friends and backers like former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and former Defense Secretary James Mattis.
US prosecutors in Holmes’ upcoming trial, which is slated to start in August after Holmes’ attorneys requested a delay due to her pregnancy, argued that the disgraced businesswoman’s lavish lifestyle and relationships with powerful people incentivized her to commit fraud.
Holmes’ attorneys retorted in February that details about Holmes’ lifestyle should not be admitted because they could spark “class prejudice” in jurors.
Theranos was once valued at $9 billion and Elizabeth Holmes’ standard of living reflected wealth on that scale.BACKGRID
Judge Edward Davila, who is overseeing the case, threaded the needle between prosecution and defense by determining that information about Holmes’ travel, salary and taste for celebrity are admissible evidence, but that details on other aspects of her lifestyle are not.
“The Government may
