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SAN JOSE, California — James Mattis, a retired four-star Marine Corps general and former secretary of defense, testified on Wednesday. Elizabeth Holmes’ fraud caseThe founder of blood test startup Theranos said he had misinformed her before and during his time on the company’s board of directors.
Mattis, who served on the board of directors for several years, said he supported the initiative’s mission of cheap, fast and easily accessible blood tests, but lost faith after The Wall Street Journal revealed major problems with the technology in 2015. He made it clear to himself that Miss Holmes had not spoken to Theranos’ executives about the problems.
“If we could only see them in the rear view mirror, we wouldn’t be able to help him with the key issues he’s grappling with,” Mattis said. He resigned from the board in late 2016 after President Donald J. Trump appointed him as secretary of defense.
Two years later, Theranos crashed Amid lawsuits, fines and financial troubles, federal prosecutors accused Ms. Holmes and her business partner Ramesh Balwani of a dozen fraud and conspiracy to commit electronic fraud. Both pleaded not guilty. If found guilty, they face up to 20 years in prison.
Mr. Mattis is the most important person to ever stand on the podium. high profile jury trialIt started in August. Other potential witnesses include media mogul Rupert Murdoch, who invested in Theranos; David Boies, the company’s outside attorney; and Bill Frist, a former senator and Theranos board member.
As Mr. Mattis spoke, Mrs. Holmes sat upright in her chair and looked in his direction.
Mr. Mattis stated that he met Ms. Holmes after a speech he gave in 2011. He was excited by the prospect of the military using Theranos’ blood analyzers, which Ms. Holmes claimed could perform thousands of different tests faster, cheaper, and more accurately. conventional laboratory tests, using only a finger blood stick. Mr Mattis said he was also personally impressed by Ms. Holmes, describing her as “sharp, outspoken, determined”.
Mr Mattis said he forced the military to run a test program of Theranos analyzers to see how they were performing with their existing systems before joining the board. “I wanted a comparative study of Theranos from Day 1 so we could get it online,” he said. But no testing took place.
When Mr. Mattis joined the board, he invested $85,000 in Theranos as a show of support, which he said was a substantial sum “for someone who has been in government service for 40 years”. He also withdrew himself from any military contract for ethical reasons.
He stated that he was not aware of any contract between Theranos and the military, which is an important allegation in the prosecution’s case against Ms. Holmes. He told investors that Theranos devices were used on battlefields in Afghanistan.
Mr. Mattis said his primary source of information about Theranos and its technology is Ms. Holmes. Prosecutors cited a presentation to the board that 10 of the 15 largest pharmaceutical companies said had validated the start-up machine, alongside approvals from researchers at Johns Hopkins University and logos from the Food and Drug Administration and the World Health Organization.
Such presentations gave Mr. Mattis confidence in Theranos’ technology, because “it wasn’t just Elizabeth who was talking about it,” he said.
After the Journal reported that Theranos only did a few blood tests on its machines, while doing the rest with conventional blood analyzers, the board struggled to gauge the report’s accuracy, according to emails presented as evidence.
Ms. Holmes emailed that Theranos had switched to a different “framework” for her lab. Mr. Mattis said he was confused and worried, but supported Ms. Holmes as he thought the problem was just a matter of texting.
“I thought there was something we could fix if we uncovered the truth,” he said.
Mr. Mattis said the problems deepened over time and he lost hope when he learned that Theranos’ machines were not working.
“There came a point where I didn’t know what to believe about Theranos anymore,” he said.
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