Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of the Theranos blood analysis laboratory, appears to have had her prison sentence reduced by approximately two years, according to federal records.
Holmes, 39, reported to a federal prison in Bryan, Texas, on May 30 to begin serving an 11-year, 3-month sentence for his role in wire fraud at the now-defunct company.
An apparent update to her inmate’s details on the Bureau of Prisons website indicated that her scheduled release date was December 29, 2032. That means she would be released roughly two years ahead of schedule.
The Bureau of Prisons did not immediately respond to an overnight request for comment from NBC News. A spokesperson for the federal agency confirmed the update to The Guardian, but said it could not comment further citing “privacy and security reasons.”
Holmes was found guilty of four counts of wire fraud in January 2022.
Nearly 20 years earlier, in 2003, he had dropped out of Stanford University at 19 to launch Theranos, a company that sought to diagnose a variety of medical conditions with just a prick of blood.
Theranos quickly rose to fame, becoming a Silicon Valley darling and at one point was valued at over $9 billion. The company also attracted investment from high-profile moguls, including Rupert Murdoch, the Walton family (heirs to the Walmart fortune) and former Education Secretary Betsy DeVos. His board of directors would grow to include former Secretaries of State George Shultz and Henry Kissinger; two former US senators; and former Secretary of Defense James Mattis.
However, Theranos’s claims of what it could do began to unravel in the face of reports that its technology did not work as claimed and could deliver faulty results.
In March 2018, the Securities and Exchange Commission charged Holmes along with Theranos COO Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani with securities fraud.
In the fall of 2022, both Holmes and Balwani, who was also convicted, were sentenced. Experts said Balwani received a harsher sentence, nearly 13 years in prison, because of his experience running other businesses.
