Elizabeth Holmes trial: Spectators line up long before dawn for first day of cross-examination

SAN JOSE — They started lining up in the cold and darkness before 2 a.m., hours before the doors opened.

But they weren’t there for a concert. They were hoping to get a coveted seat on the wooden benches inside the federal courthouse in San Jose to see the now-disgraced former rock star of the tech world, Elizabeth Holmes, be cross-examined by prosecutors in her criminal trial.

Brad Agle, a business ethics professor at Brigham Young University, got there at 1:30 a.m. and was second in line.

During a CEO conference in 2015, Agle met and later befriended Tyler Shultz, grandson of George Shultz, former U.S. Secretary of State. Shultz worked at Theranos for eight months before blowing the whistle on the fraud and deception he said he witnessed.

Agle wrote about Shultz and also interviewed Erika Cheung, a former Theranos lab associate and whistleblower. When Agle first flew in for the trial two weeks ago, he met up with Shultz for dinner.

“The first female billionaire entrepreneur in Silicon Valley — that alone is a huge story,” Agle said. “It’s got the aspect of huge scandal and fraud. Then, of course, it’s medical testing. You’re talking about giving people incorrect diagnoses, that they have cancer or they are pregnant when they’re not. This whole ‘fake-it-until-you-make-it’ in Silicon Valley, at what level can you fake it? Did Elizabeth go too far in faking it? I would say yes, but she’s not alone. There’s a whole culture of fake-it-until-you-make-it.”

Scott Borden, a legal recruiter, left his home in Los Angeles at around 10:50 p.m. Monday and drove to San Jose. By 3 a.m., there were already six people waiting outside and at around 4:17 a.m., Borden checked in and was 32nd in line.

“A lot of people have been here every day. It’s my first time, I hope I get in. Hope it was worth the drive,” Borden said.

At around 8 a.m., Holmes breezed through the building’s entrance flanked by her mother, Noel Holmes, and her partner, Billy Evans, as a flurry of people hurried to snap a quick photo.

People have been lining up early throughout the trial, but interest grew when Theranos founder Holmes — a Stanford drop-out who Forbes magazine once said was worth $4.5 billion — took the stand last week.

Borden was among the people hoping to get a seat in Courtroom 4, presided over by Judge Edward Davila. The rest of the spectators filed into the overflow room on the 4th floor, where around 25 or so people watched the trial on a monitor.

Holmes gave explosive testimony on Monday, accusing former company president and romantic partner Sunny Balwani of belittling her, controlling her and forcing sex on her. Holmes faces 11 fraud charges and if convicted, could get up to 20 years in prison. Prosecutors allege Holmes and Balwani defrauded patients with false claims about Theranos’ technology and swindled more than $700 million from investors in the now-defunct company. Both Holmes and Balwani have denied the allegations. Balwani is to be tried separately.

Holmes faced relentless cross-examination Tuesday, fielding questions from prosecutor Robert Leach about the methods used to allegedly try to quash a Wall Street Journal investigation and threaten internal whistleblowers.

“I saw the HBO documentary and was stunned,” Borden said while standing in line. “My first thought was who would believe this is a real thing? But a lot of people did and spent a lot of money on it but I’m just fascinated by people who can sell snake oil and I also love jury trials. I thought it’d be interesting to see it in action.”

Josephine Ruiz, of San Jose, who was also in line outside the courthouse, works as a nurse and remembers a doctor mentioning Theranos around 15 years ago. Ruiz expressed skepticism about the company’s claims that they could conduct a litany of tests using a few drops of blood.

“I kept an ear out because it would really be wonderful if something like that happened. Because I do work in healthcare and I see what it’s like when we have to poke people often for vast quantities of blood for those tests, the fact that it was all a lie and possibly a purposeful lie is very distressing because that’s people’s lives in danger,” Ruiz said, as her eyes welled up with tears. “Why would you do that? That’s what I’m interested in.”

Susie Schinski, of Menlo Park, works at Apple and read ‘Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup’ when it was first released.

“I’m curious how this will be for women in the future, women who are trying to be CEOs and start new companies and get funding to break through things,” she said from her place in line. “Is she going to have ruined it for a lot of women? Every time a woman comes through, they’re going to question if this is another Elizabeth Holmes or is she for real?

In the line for security, the Theranos trial was the talk of the morning as guards joked about the “uncomfortable” wooden benches in the courtroom. The mood in the overflow room was more solemn, with one person darting out with a noisy granola bar in order to not disturb the other spectators.

“This is kind of historical,” Ruiz said. “I don’t want to give her the foot in the door of being part of history but at the time, we don’t get to see a lot of things in San Jose. It’s San Francisco, it’s L.A., it’s other parts of the country. I live down the street, so it’s nice to be able to witness something happening like this.”