The judge’s decision means Holmes,39,will have to surrender to authorities on April 27 to start the more than 11-year prison sentence that Davila imposed in November. The punishment came 10 months after a jury found her guilty on four counts of fraud and conspiracy against the Theranos investors who believed in her promises to revolutionise the health care industry.
Holmes had accompanied her lawyers to a San Jose,California,courtroom on March 17 to try to convince Davila that various missteps by federal prosecutors,and the omission of key evidence,will culminate in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals exonerating her.
Holmes’ prison sentence is scheduled to start roughly 20 years after she dropped out of Stanford University when she was 19 years old to start Theranos in Palo Alto,California — the same city where William Hewlett and David Packard founded a company bearing their surnames in a small garage and planted the seeds of what grew into Silicon Valley.
Holmes could still file another appeal of Davila’s latest ruling,a manoeuvre herco-conspirator at Theranos — Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani — successfully used to delay his scheduled March 16 date to begin a nearly 13-year prison sentence. But the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals last week rejected that appeal,and Balwani is now scheduled to report to a Southern California prison on April 20.
Davila has recommended Holmes serve her sentence in a Bryan,Texas,prison. It hasn’t yet been publicly confirmed if that will be the facility where she reports.
Unless she can find a way to stay free,Holmes will be separated from the two children she had leading up to the trial and after her conviction.