Defense attorneys for Elizabeth Homes are expected to wrap up their closing arguments Friday in the fraud trial of the Theranos founder at a San Jose courthouse, and the jury could start deliberations as soon as Friday afternoon.
Closing arguments began Thursday with prosecutors telling jurors Holmes chose to deceive investors and patients, a choice that "was not only callous, it was criminal."
"Ms. Holmes made the decision to defraud her investors, and then to defraud patients," Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Schenk said. "She chose fraud over business failure. She chose to be dishonest with investors and with patients."
Holmes is accused of defrauding investors of hundreds of millions of dollars and endangering the lives of patients, all of whom believed in the company's "breakthrough" blood testing technology.
The defense countered the prosecution's assertions Thursday by saying it was never Holmes's intent to mislead. She was "building a company, not a criminal enterprise," her attorney said.
Holmes went from Stanford dropout at 19 to the world’s first self-made billionaire woman at 31. Now at 37, Holmes has seen her Silicon Valley company shut down, and she faces up to 20 years in prison for each of the fraud counts against her.
During the trial, government prosecutors called 29 witnesses, several of whom testified that Theranos tests showed mistaken results, and Holmes knew the tech was faulty as she continued to pitch it to investors and consumers.
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Legal analyst Michele Hagan said in reviewing months of testimony, it's important for prosecutors to keep jurors focused.
"If you can tie it together instead of repeating it, you can actually explain to the jury why we care about this case," Hagan said. "We care about this case because Elizabeth Holmes' technology put patients lives and health at stake."
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Defense attorneys during the trial called three witnesses, including Holmes, who testified she was manipulated by ex-boyfriend and fellow Theranos executive Sunny Balwani, calling him mentally and physically abusive and controlling.
Holmes also testified she dropped out of Stanford because she had been raped on campus.
Once closing arguments and jury instructions conclude, the jury of eight men and four women will be handed the case, and they're expected to deliberate over the holiday week, according to a report from CNBC.
CNBC contributed to this report.
