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Available on Google Play and the App Store. Previously on the dropout, we heard from a man with deep connections to many of the central players in Elizabeth's orbit and learned that fake Pfizer memo wasn't the only document Theranos falsified. The defense might have been able to wiggle their way out of one of the reports, but now that there's two of them, that's a hard battle for them to contest.
This week, we hear from two Theranos lab directors, one who never met Elizabeth or set foot in the company's lab. Very, very strange. That was the only time I've ever come across that. Another who ultimately voided over 50,000 Theranos tests after a damning government inspection. And the government's most fired up witness yet, and I raid investor who says Elizabeth Holmes cut off communications when he asked for basic information takes the stand.
Now, some way say he just lost a million dollars. I'm sure he's angry and no one would talk to him. But we contrast that with almost all the other government witnesses who for a variety of reasons were very calm, very composed on the witness stand, and really didn't seem to harbor that kind of anger that he's certainly showing. From ABC Audio, this is the dropout of Elizabeth Holmes on trial. I'm Rebecca Jarvis. Episode 13, the beginning of the end.
Over the course of 10 weeks, we've heard from 24 of the 181 witnesses on the government's list. Jurors, journalists, the public, maybe even Elizabeth herself, anticipated the end was nowhere in sight. But following last week's testimony, prosecutor Jeffrey Shank delivered a surprising update. This may be the prosecution's last week before it rests its case.
Santa Clara University Law Professor Ellen Kreitzberg was as surprised as the rest of us, but says the timeline actually makes a lot of sense. Well, I think the government is looking to try and get this case to the jury as soon as possible, because looking at two alternates left, we're coming to the holidays, we're in COVID pandemic, they do not want to lose jurors and have this case end up in a mistrial. Once the prosecution rests, the ball is in the defense's court.
Will we eventually hear from Elizabeth herself? Kreitzberg is dubious. I can't imagine the defense is going to put her on. With one caveat, she is someone who has been very successful over many years in convincing people to her point of view. And I'm sure there's part of her that would like to be able to sit there and look at the jury and be able to tell her side of the story. From a lawyer's perspective, I just can't imagine
that they want to put her on the stand. We'll soon know, but for the moment, the prosecution continues to press ahead, reinforcing patterns, introducing jurors to more scientists who testify that they witnessed lapses in Theranos' lab, more frustrated investors, and driving home the point, Elizabeth was the one calling the shots. The prosecution kicked things off by calling lab director Dr. Lynette Sawyer to the stand.
She was not on the government's original witness list, but she was added, it seems, in response to the defense's cross-examination of a witness we heard from a few weeks ago. Dermatologist turned Theranos lab director Dr. Senile Dewan. Recall in November 2014, Theranos was in a bind. Lab director Dr. Adam Rosendorf had quit, and the company was scrambling to find a replacement. Sunny Bullwani, the company COO at the time, called in a favor, asking his friend and dermatologist
of 15 years to briefly fill in until they found a permanent replacement. Dr. Dewan, who was legally qualified to be a lab director, agreed. In his first eight months at Theranos, Dewan would set foot in the lab just twice, and would meet Elizabeth for the first time, ten months into his tenure during a government audit. But as we learned in Dr. Dewan's cross-examination, there was another lab director working at Theranos
during much of the same period. Dewan said he'd never met this person, and couldn't even recall her name. In a deposition with the SEC, it seemed Sunny couldn't either. Who were the other lab directors at Theranos? After Mr. Rosendorf left, we had another gentleman, his name was Senile Dewan, as a lab director. We also had another consultant who was co-lab director at that time for the lab. Her first name was Jeanette. I forget her last name.
Lynette, not Jeanette Sawyer. First came on board when Sunny made a call to laboratory consulting services. A consulting firm that, among other things, helps companies find lab specialists. The consultancy led by Jerry Hearst recommended Dr. Sawyer. We spoke to Hearst about the experience. I contacted Lynette and said, you know, I'm being contacted by Theranos. They want to attempt
lab director. Would you venture to talk into them? The answer was yes. Dr. Sawyer testified she then spoke to Sunny, who told her Theranos needed a two to three-month filler until they had another director who was going to be coming on. Dr. Sawyer agreed, and she came on board right around the time Dr. Dewan was hired. From Jerry Hearst perspective, nothing about the process seemed unusual at that point. So I went ahead and negotiated her monthly retainer and signed the contract and then she
became officially their lab director. Initially, it was pretty straightforward. You know, she appeared to be comfortable with whatever was they were telling her about their laboratory operation. How common is it for companies like Theranos to hire these temporary lab directors as opposed to more full-time roles? Very common. I would say the vast majority of the labs that we work with, especially the startup labs rely on part-time contract laboratory directors to provide those services.
Sunny in his SEC deposition reiterated this as well. I mean, lab directors is not required that you have to be full-time. As a matter of fact, up until recently in California, a lab director could be a lab director for infinite number of labs. Now I think it's five. While Dr. Dewan was taking a back seat, barely visiting the lab himself, Dr. Sawyer wasn't doing much more. In fact, Dr. Sawyer testified she never once set foot inside of a Theranos lab or even the Theranos building.
She could barely name any Theranos employees and told the court she only ever communicated with three people while she worked there. The first time she'd ever laid eyes on Elizabeth in person was right there in the courtroom. The two had never spoken. Dr. Sawyer's only job it seemed was to electronically sign off on standard operating procedures or SOPs. Dr. Sawyer testified that she didn't have a person that she could talk to about issues she had with some of those SOPs.
She was basically being asked to docu-sign documents without being able to edit them, without being able to check them, investigate them or talk to anyone about them. And like Mr. Dewan wasn't really involved in running the lab, the two of them were really document signers. Dr. Sawyer also testified she never saw Theranos device. And it never heard of Theranos' blood testing device, the Edison, or various other pieces of the company's proprietary technology,
including its signature nanotainer. Is it common that a proprietary device, one of the main things that a company wants to be known for is not known to the lab director overseeing things? Yeah, certainly potentially could be very problematic, absolutely. Yeah. And based on Dr. Sawyer's knowledge of the company, it was her understanding that Theranos only performed tests on traditional FDA-approved blood analyzers, as in third-party machines. Remember, this was 2014 when Theranos was already
testing real-life patients in Walgreens, partially on its own devices. Sawyer said she had no knowledge of this. Is it your impression that Theranos was doing something other than running blood tests on ordinary FDA-approved machines and ordinary FDA-approved tests, prosecutor Robert Leach asked? No, Dr. Sawyer replied. Leach showed a list of the 12 tests Theranos was using its device for, and asked Dr. Sawyer, at the time you were the lab director, you had no idea that
Theranos was using its device to test for these 12? Correct, Dr. Sawyer replied. Lab consultant Jerry Hurst says this would be highly unusual, and would have put Dr. Sawyer in a very difficult position. How problematic or troubling is it that Theranos didn't let their lab director know they were performing some of their tests on their own devices? That's very, very problematic because you know she says director has the fiduciary duties and liability of the
laboratory operation. So for a company to keep anything from their director, that would be very serious in my opinion. As her time at Theranos progressed, Dr. Sawyer told the court she grew increasingly uncomfortable with the way things were done. She said she'd had no way to voice concerns if they arose. Did you feel like you were being given the information that you needed to do your assignment, prosecutor Leach asked? No, Dr. Sawyer confirmed. She'd had enough and told
her. She started having real problems with them and doubts and talked to me saying that she wasn't comfortable as their lab director and I said well that's just drop it, we'll break the contract then. In what would be her second and final conversation with Sunny, Dr. Sawyer quit. She said Sunny encouraged her to stay and that things got a little uncomfortable because he was a bit pushy about it. But Dr. Sawyer stood firm. In June 2015, six months into her tenure, she was out.
The government's questioning of Dr. Sawyer was quick, only about 18 minutes. But according to Ellen Kreitzberg, it accomplished a lot. She was a good witness, she was thoughtful in her responses, she talked about the fact that she left even though they wanted her to stay because she was uncomfortable with the way the lab was being run. She was uncomfortable with them asking her to sign documents that she couldn't either edit nor verify and she was uncomfortable with the lack
of information she was being given. So she is consistent with the government's theme about how they were addressing the lab and how it was being run by Sunny, Bolwani and Elizabeth Holmes and she just confirms that as well. In the cross examination, defense attorney Lance Wade spent his time
directly challenging points made by the prosecution. Regarding Dr. Sawyer's testimony that she'd never heard of co-lab director Dr. Dewan, Wade pointed out that in the agreement between Dr. Sawyer and Theranos, it clearly stated she was going to be co-director, which she confirmed she'd understood.
Sometimes labs have kind of pinch hit her lab directors, right? Wade asked, I suppose you could call co-directors that, sometimes Dr. Sawyer replied, Wade also pointed to language in the agreement stating it would be a temporary and limited engagement only up to about five hours a week. You're not going to be required to be on site, he asked, correct, she replied, Wade addressed Dr. Sawyer's testimony about feeling uncomfortable
with the conditions under which she was working. He asked if she'd communicated this to anyone at the company. I contacted the woman who'd sent me the standard operating procedures through email, she told him. But you didn't call anyone to have a conversation to try to change the conditions under which you worked. No, she said. Professor Kreitsberg says the cross examination played right into themes we've heard from the defense before. It's a similar approach to what they did with
the investors. She was a well credentialed intelligent person in an area of responsibility. She should have asked these questions and she should have done the investigation instead of just being willing to sign documents. And so they're going to shift blame to her for failing to have done that those inquiries. Wade later turned to the 12 tests that were run on Theronose's
own technology. The one's Dr. Sawyer testified she'd had no knowledge of. Just so we're clear, none of those tests came into the lab when you were serving as the laboratory director, correct, wait asked, correct, said Dr. Sawyer, the implication being if they weren't in the lab,
they weren't her concern. Ultimately, Professor Kreitsberg thinks the cross examination came out a little thin, but believes if the government wants to make its narrative stick, prosecutors will have to connect the dots and closing arguments between what was happening at Theronose's lab and what was simultaneously occurring inside Walgreens amidst all the technical issues. What has to happen with the two lab directors is they're going to have to juxtapose their
placement in the lab with what was happening with the commercial rollout. Because in and of itself, well, it looks like they're not running the lab properly. We don't really see what the impact is, but if we juxtapose those actions are the lack of real work in the lab with a big commercial rollout, that's when we start to see that there may be fraud that's occurring with respect to this information. This is Brad Milky, host of ABC's Daily News Podcast, start here. More drop out in a minute,
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that start here available wherever you listen. In late 2015, Justice Theranos was dealing with its revolving door of lab directors. Even bigger problems were brewing for the company. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, or CMS, the federal regulator that oversees all laboratory testing in the United States, was conducting an audit of Theranos. And they'd made some troubling discoveries. On January 25, 2016, CMS sent Theranos a letter declaring the company
was posing immediate jeopardy to patient health and safety. Over the course of 121 pages, CMS documented numerous violations of regulatory standards, issues with Theranos' quality controls, test results, devices, and methods of testing. Lab consultant Jerry Hurst says that would be reflective of extensive problems. 120-page statement of deficiencies would be typical if the laboratory has multiple condition and standard level deficiencies. So typical if there are a lot of
problems? Exactly. We know from Elizabeth's 2017 SEC deposition, Theranos at the time was also in talks with drug store chain CVS, but apparently the CMS discoveries put an end to that. What happened? We ended up receiving, I think it was a notification of sanctions from CMS and trying to work through those issues and then decided to exit the clinical lab business. So did you terminate the discussions or did CVS terminate? I think the last email was keep us posted.
Elizabeth also claimed the CMS violations helped extinguish Theranos' relationship with Safeway. Did Theranos ever end up rolling out its services in Safeway stores? No. Why not? We couldn't agree on a model to do that. And ultimately by the time we did agree, we were dealing with the issues in our clinical lab with CMS. With CMS's 10-day deadline fast approaching, Theranos turned to its newly hired lab director and the government's 23rd witness, Dr. King Shuk Doss.
Like other lab directors who'd come before him, Dr. Doss started at Theranos working part time, visiting the lab about once a week, beginning in December 2015. When CMS sent Theranos the threatening report, Dr. Doss had only been with the company for a handful of weeks. He'd only just recently interviewed for the job with Elizabeth, whom we'd found impressive, but who also gave no indication that there were issues on the horizon, even though it was already known inside of
Theranos that the CMS audit was underway. As Dr. Doss described it to the jury, handling the CMS violations was nearly his sole responsibility. Dr. Doss told the court he and Elizabeth had many conversations about CMS's findings and how the company was going to respond. CMS had found that 29 percent of Theranos' quality control samples on all tests and devices were violating regulatory standards. Dr. Doss testified that he investigated this claim and agreed with the finding.
Additionally, Dr. Doss said he found instances where Theranos reported patient results from the Edison device after it failed quality control. Dr. Doss said he tried to make the report more accessible to Elizabeth by using what he called an easily digestible example. Dr. Doss told Elizabeth Theranos' PSA test meant to detect prostate cancer by measuring the levels of prostate specific antigen, was returning results indicating quite a few female patients had the protein in their
blood, a highly improbable outcome. Why was that a red flag to you as the prosecution? Because females generally don't have PSA, it should only be detected at males testified Dr. Doss. But Elizabeth, rather than accepting Dr. Doss and CMS's findings, came back with her own alternative explanation. The college dropout, with no medical degree, suggested to Dr. Doss that the testing question indicated the females had a rare form of breast cancer.
As Dr. Doss recalled to the court, Elizabeth had printed a few articles to back up her theory. But Elizabeth's explanation seemed implausible to Dr. Doss. Ultimately, after reviewing extensive data from Theranos' Edison machines between 2014 and 2015, Dr. Doss concluded the company should void all the estimated 50 to 60,000 tests entirely. After additional discussions with Elizabeth, which Dr. Doss testified included more pushback,
he and his team wrote to CMS in the official response to their findings. The fraction of patient results truly impacted and the nature and magnitude of any effect are unknown. Out of an abundance of caution, the laboratory has voided all patient test results reported from Theranos devices. Did you in fact void all the test results from the Edison device from the 2014-2015 time period, Leachast? Yes, we did, so Dr. Doss. It's a fact that could actually help both the prosecution
and the defense according to Professor Kreitsberg. So the voiding of the test also has both sides with a little piece of good and a little piece of bad. The government's going to argue, voiding this many tests shows the level of inaccuracy, the level of problems. The defense, on the other hand, is going to argue when they saw the problem, they tried to take care of the problem. They not only voided the test, they sent out notices to each one of those patients telling them
the tests had been voided. They were willing to take the hit publicly in order to make sure that this went forward in a proper, accurate and reliable manner. When defense attorney Lance Wade began his cross-examination, he reminded the jury of Dr. Doss' impressive credentials. Dr. Doss had a degree in biochemistry and a medical degree from Case Western. He'd spent years in the field, including running UCLA's clinical lab. Then Wade immediately reminded the jury why Dr. Doss was
hired at Theranos. Hammering home the point, he was specifically brought in to improve Theranos' lab practices. You are the quarterback for that whole effort. Is that fair? Yes, Doss responded. Okay, and was it your observation that this team was working really hard and diligently and in good faith and that they were trying to do everything that they could try to strengthen the laboratory practices at Theranos? Yes, responded Doss. Continuing the sports analogy, Wade then asked Dr. Doss
whether Elizabeth was supportive of the lab director as quarterback of this team. Yes, Dr. Doss replied. Elizabeth had encouraged him to go back and review everything. Wade also noted when Dr. Doss joined the company Theranos was assembling a scientific advisory board that included a former CDC head and other respected members of the scientific community. He also reminded the jury it was Dr. Doss'
job, not Elizabeth's, to oversee the lab. It's a theme that's come up in a number of cross-examinations. The defense theory seems to be at every step to blame the lab director that for the most part, the lab director is beginning with Dr. Rosendorf and then ending with Dr. Sawyer and Dr. Doss were very well qualified, very capable, very knowledgeable about lab protocol requirements. They keep bringing out you knew Elizabeth Holmes wasn't qualified to run a lab. She was young, she was naive.
And so they're clearly making the lab director's responsible for what was going wrong in the lab. But Professor Kreitsberg says this can be a difficult strategy when the defense is trying to cast blame too widely. So while blaming others is a very typical defense approach to a case and often a very valid and legitimate one, the challenge in this case is there's a lot of people being blamed
instead of Elizabeth Holmes who is running the company. So it becomes a little bit more challenging when you're blaming several people for different reasons in order to move the guilt away from yourself. When it came to the estimated 50 to 60,000 voided tests, Wade brought up a meeting that took place between Dr. Doss, Elizabeth and some others. Dr. Doss said there had been some disagreement in the meeting. But Wade asked, do you recall that Miss Holmes fully supported your decision to void all
of the results? Yes, Doss responded. Wade also addressed Theronosis PSA test and Elizabeth's alternative explanation. Reminding the court, there are endocrinologists who have detected PSA in females on occasion. But he further drove home the point that while Dr. Doss and Elizabeth may not have seen eye to eye on the results, in the end, she did ultimately refer to Doss and
his expertise and the tests were voided. The defense also, according to Kreitsburg, effectively woven the significance of Sonny's departure from Theronose. Once Sonny leaves, suddenly Elizabeth Holmes is able to insert herself in a supervised reposition with the lab. And in doing that, she essentially says to them, do whatever you have to do to make this right. And they're going to argue what happened before was all about what Sonny
Balwani was doing. And he was in charge of the lab and in charge of the lab directors. And once Elizabeth Holmes was in charge of them, everything changed. The defense finally concluded by asking Dr. Doss what he thought about Theronose in June 2018 when he left the company. Did you still believe in the mission and what it had hoped to accomplish?
Asdwayd? Yes, Dr. Doss replied. Wade then asked Dr. Doss if he recalled a quote from his favorite film, the best exotic miracle hotel, which Doss had apparently at one point like it to Theronose. Everything will be all right in the end. And if it's not all right, then it's not the end. And I suspect he's going to turn that into some theme and closing argument of this was a company in transition. This was a company constantly evolving. And if it wasn't okay at that very moment,
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Minnesota has some of the best mountain biking in the country. From gorgeous reclaimed iron mines to the rocky terrain of Lake Superior's North Shore. Discover what makes Minnesota the star of the North. ExploreMinnesota.com Like so many investors we've heard from in this trial, the next witness called to the stand had zero experience investing in biotech companies and learned about Theranos through a friend.
Alan Eisenman, a financial advisor and money manager, testified that he first heard about Elizabeth from his close personal friend, David Harris, who happened to be a financial advisor to the Holmes family. He told me that Elizabeth was brilliant, that she was dropping out of school to start a company and she was partially on her way, testified Eisenman. From his first conversation
with Elizabeth, like so many others, Eisenman was immediately moved. Eisenman testified, Elizabeth told him oracles Larry Allison had joined her board, invested in her company, and was serving as her personal advisor, and that Theranos had already landed important contracts with pharma companies. I took notes, Eisenman testified, and it was an impressive list of companies, like Pfizer, Bristol Myers, Novartis. To me, that put an additional stamp of approval on
the investment. Eisenman also said he understood the technology was significantly far along for an early stage company. Based on how Elizabeth presented it, Eisenman said he got the impression in 2006 that the technology was to a point where it was solving problems and it was being used, and that there were going to be future iterations and future improvements. Eisenman, like other investors, was also presented with enticing revenue projections.
He said Elizabeth told him the company was on track to make potentially $200 million in revenue by 2008, a significant number for a young startup. So on October 13, 2006, Eisenman, his wife, and their three children collectively invested about a million dollars in Theranos. Eisenman said following his investment, he and Elizabeth would speak regularly about once a quarter,
and he was thrilled. On a spring break trip to California, Eisenman even took his son to visit Elizabeth and got a tour of the lab at Theranos' headquarters, where they were shown an early version of the technology. Things seemed to be pretty rosy, but as time wore on, Elizabeth's communications with Eisenman grew more scarce. By the spring of 2010, Eisenman was struggling to schedule a call with Elizabeth, and he was getting
frustrated. He had put a considerable amount of money for him and his family into Theranos, and he wasn't getting the kind of contact or information he expected. And he let Elizabeth and others at the company know it, frequently reaching out, asking for more information. His communications apparently became such a point of frustration for Theranos. Elizabeth even recommended Eisenman exit the investment, telling him if he sold then, he'd get a 5x return on the money he'd
put with Theranos. But Eisenman held on to his investment. I was more proactive as a stakeholder than other stakeholders, and management, particularly Elizabeth, did not like the fact that I was trying to communicate and trying to get information. In November 2012, Eisenman reached out via email to then-board chair Don Lucas about the status of his investment, writing that he hadn't heard from the company in two years. Elizabeth chimed into the conversation in an email. No, Alan, it has been
about that long since you decided to start harassing our chairman. Despite the fact we communicated multiple times, that if you did so, we would no longer respond to your request to talk to you in light of all our past interactions. To the company's amazement, you've continued to do so on an ongoing basis ever since we had those conversations with you. Eisenman shot back with his own message.
Elizabeth, it has been over two years since you communicated with your investors. I emailed you one week ago following your instructions that investors should communicate directly with the company. According to Professor Kreitsberg, the heated email exchange was an important moment for the prosecution. One of the things we saw that we had not seen with other investors was an angry exchange in email, even between Elizabeth Holmes with why do you keep asking me these questions?
We've been over them. As far as they can see, Elizabeth Holmes is charming, lovely, everyone from general Maddaz to the CEO of Safeway respected her. So they're not seeing that side of Theranos or that side of Elizabeth Holmes. And Alan Eisenman gives us a small glimpse of that kind of strategic pressure by them. Despite what he considered a frustrating lack of contact, Eisenman hung on to his investment. And that in December 2013, he received the same email that was
sent to other early investors. Theranos was offering Eisenman the chance to put more money into the company as long as he could meet the New Year's Eve deadline. Eisenman replied to the message and, to his surprise, received a very quick response from Sonny who wanted to hop on a call right away. Eisenman described it as a 180-degree shift, and apparently the new tone worked.
On Christmas Day, Eisenman wired Theranos $100,000. But why would Eisenman want to invest more with Theranos after such bad experiences previously, prosecutor Bostak asked? This is what we call a seat at the table, Explayed Eisenman. If you put money in at an early stage, and they're successful, you're the first one that's allowed to put money in as they raise more, and the valuation increases he testified. Eisenman also saw the launch at Walgreens and the glowing
publicity at the time as reasons to feel confident. But history proved to repeat itself once again, when in early October 2014, Eisenman tried to get in touch with Elizabeth and Sonny. Eisenman had just read a negative report about Theranos by investment bank UBS. So he fired off an email to the blood testing company. UBS claims the blood samples have to be sent to Palo Alto. They are less reliable than traditional tests, and the turnaround time is over 24 hours,
he wrote. Eisenman told the court the UBS report was totally contradictory to what he'd been told by Elizabeth and Sonny. Sonny responded to the email, rushing off the report, writing, this sounds like an uninformed consultant. According to Eisenman, Sonny's response raised suspicions. Did you take this as a denial of the information in the UBS report, Bostak asked? It was an opportunity to deny it, but it was not really addressing the situation. Explain,
Eisenman. Eisenman replied asking for more information and received a response from Sonny with an all-too-familiar tone. I have no intention of responding to this email and explaining the tech and processes. Please stop sending me emails every day. But Eisenman wasn't satisfied. Replying again, I don't mean to bother you. I am close to retirement and I am trying to decide whether to lighten up. Hopefully, there'll be additional information available in the not-too-distant
future. Months later, in March 2015, Theranos' valuation had surged to $9 billion. The brand was flourishing in the press. Elizabeth was center-stage at major events, and Theranos had attracted hundreds of millions in additional investments from Megan investors, like the Walton's and the DeVos family. Eisenman said he was ready to exit his investment, and he reached out to Sonny for more information. Sonny replied that there wouldn't be an exit opportunity that year.
But Eisenman pushed back, telling Sonny he was retiring, and his daughter was looking to buy a house. At the very least, Eisenman wanted to know when the opportunity to exit might come up. It is really unfair for you to play this cat-and-mouse game with me. I have been a shareholder for over nine years, Eisenman wrote Sonny. Sonny fired off an angry reply writing, your emails are insulting, full of inaccurate statements, and wasteful of our time. Our next
response to this email and all your future emails will come from our council. Instead of a gigantic windfall, or even a modest return, Eisenman, who'd wanted to sell his shares at the height of Theranos' valuation, would lose the entire investment. Defense Attorney Kevin Downey kicked off the cross-examination with a strategy we've now seen many times. Playing up Eisenman's credentials and qualifications, the fact that he was connected
and in the know. You had your ears open on an ongoing basis to make an effort to try to hear about private investing opportunities that might be of interest to you. Correct? Downey asked? Correct, Eisenman said. Downey also used the cross to remind the jury about Elizabeth's own backstory. Her roots in Houston, her family, the fact she got into a great college, Stanford.
The defense has repeatedly elicited information from government witnesses to both humanize Elizabeth Holmes to portray her more sympathetically and to give her a third dimension and not just the person who's masked in the courtroom every day. They've done a very effective job of it.
Really, that information has nothing to do with the charges of the case or her guilt or innocence in this case, but it's an effective way to get the jury to look at her sympathetically, to view some of this evidence through that lens, which actually I think is being quite effective. Downey turned to pharmaceutical companies and pointed out that Theronos did have an agreement with Smith Klein that was noted in the stock purchase agreement. Eisenman shot back.
Can you show me on this agreement where she's doing business with Pfizer, Bristol Myers, and Novartis? Because that's what she told me. Downey quickly moved to strike that comment from the record. Judge Dovela obliged. The courtroom became tense. You don't mean to imply to this jury that Miss Holmes did not have agreements or discussions with these companies. I think you're saying that you don't know correct? Downey asked. Um, skeptical responded, Eisenman.
Well, do you have any foundation to know that? I have a history of information that was told to me over the course of years that was not accurate. Said Eisenman. Excuse me? Downey replied. Judge Dovela then chimed in. You asked the question. Downey continued questioning, Eisenman. Excuse me. You don't know what was going on internally at Theronos in terms of their working with pharmaceutical companies. Do you? I had some pretty strong evidence from a lot of sources
that a lot of things that were told to me were not accurate. Eisenman responded. Seemingly trying to turn down the temperature, Downey started asking Eisenman about his experience investing in private companies. But Eisenman's responses didn't allow it. Your train is a lawyer, correct? Not exactly. I went to law school. I did tax work. It was, I didn't practice in these areas of law. Said Eisenman. Well, I think a tax lawyer counts as a lawyer. But if you don't accept
it, that's okay. Said Downey. It wasn't long before Eisenman began arguing again with Downey. Downey asked Eisenman to confirm the actual language in his Theronos stock purchase agreement. But instead, Eisenman blurted out. What is more important are conversations that you have with the principles, and they will tell you what their thoughts are, what they think will happen. And that's more important than the statement. Judge Dovela intervened again. Mr. Eisenman. Mr.
Eisenman, I'm sorry, sir. I appreciate your assistance here, but you just need to listen to his questions and then answer the question as best you can. And then he'll ask you another question. Needless to say, Downey asked Dovela to strike Eisenman's answer. And Dovela did. But the conversation continued to derail, culminating in Dovela essentially begging Eisenman to stay on
course. Mr. Eisenman, Mr. Eisenman, I have to stop you again, sir. So I'm going to ask you to focus on the lawyers, not just this lawyer, but any lawyer who asks you a question, just focus on the question that they ask. Professor Kreitzberg says Eisenman's combative demeanor could play a role in how the jury sees his testimony. Does it matter that he's really fired up? How is that translating to the jury? It's always hard to know how jurors react to the witness's demeanor.
They're actually instructed and told they should look at the demeanor on the stand and it's something they can consider in evaluating the truthfulness or untruthfulness of their testimony. So demeanor of a witness is something under the law jurors should look at. Now some way say, he just lost a million dollars. I'm sure he's angry and no one would talk to him. No one would
give him information. But we contrast that with almost all the other government witnesses who for a variety of reasons were very calm, very composed on the witness stand and really didn't seem to harbor that kind of anger that he's certainly showing. It was the most heated cross examination we've seen and it abruptly came to an end. With Eisenman still on the stand, time ran out and court had to adjourn for the week. We'll see if he's as fired up when he returns.
But overall, Professor Kreitsberg thinks this week was a possible turning point for the defense in Elizabeth. I think at the end of this week, certainly the defense is making a very strong case for the fact that she should not be held accountable. I think the compassionate way they're presenting her and the information they're presenting her and the unappealing nature of the victims who are these wealthy investors could just tip the scales despite the amount of evidence this is certainly
not a slam dunk for the government. Coming up, could this be the prosecution's last week of witnesses? Who will the government put on the stand before it rests its case? Among the remaining names on the original list of 181 whistleblower Tyler Schultz, Theronosa Turnie, David Boyz, and former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. We haven't heard from any of them yet, and Ellen Kreitsberg says we likely never will. Most of those witnesses aren't going to be called because they come with a lot
of baggage. Are we going to hear from Elizabeth? What's your bed? I think the defense is going to think long and hard before they're willing to put her on the stand. We are likely to finally hear from Roger Parlov, the man behind the bombshell fortune article who says he was duped by Elizabeth and became an unwitting player in her deception. I got caught up in this woman's story. I began to drink the Kool-Aid so yeah, I've learned some rough lessons. I think I asked the right questions.
I just got the wrong answers. Tune in next Tuesday. Elizabeth Holmes and Sunnybell Wani did not respond or declined to comment for this podcast. Some material including court depositions were edited for clarity and time. The dropout Elizabeth Holmes on trial is written and reported by Victoria Thompson, Taylor Dunne, and me. Victoria is the executive producer, Taylor and I are producers. For ABC audio, Suzy Lewis
producer and Madeline Wood and Marwell Mulaki are associate producers. Dia Athan and Miles Cohen are court producers. For ABC's business unit, our associate producer is Victor Ordoniaz, and our production assistant is Lane Wynn. Mixing and scoring is by Suzy Liu and Evan Viola. Evan also composed the music for the dropout. Our artwork is by Teddy Blanks at Chips & Y and Cedric
Hanstad. For ABC audio, Liz Alessie is executive producer. Special thanks to Josh Cohen, Elizabeth Bruso, Ian Rosenberg, Eric Abram, and Stacia De Shishko.