Talk:United States v. Elizabeth A. Holmes, et al.

Giving this page some life

Hi all,

I welcome any and all edits and suggestions! BiscuitsToTheRescue (talk) 21:21, 25 September 2021 (UTC)

"up to 20 years in federal prison, plus potentially millions in restitution and fines."

The above quote from the lead is technically unsourced, but I have no doubt that newspapers have run something similar. The problem is that the 20 years is the maximum statutory limit for the wire fraud charges, but in no way a realistic estimate of the sentence (should the prosecution secure a conviction).

I would suggest to remove it, unless someone can find a reliable source that did an estimate under the United States Federal Sentencing Guidelines. (Yes, the guidelines are advisory; but they are still followed in 90%+ of cases, and when they deviate it is usually downwards.)

For "fun" I did my own (WP:OR) calculation based on the 2021 manual as follows: §2B1.1 applies, offense level is 7 (base) + 16 (loss greater than $1.5m, 1) + 2 (more than 10 victims, 2A) + 2 ("sophisticated means", 10C) + 4 (violation of security laws by an officer of a publicly traded company, 20A, I am not sure if it applies) = 31. Criminal history category is 0 (no previous relevant conviction, I think?). Assuming no reduction applies (surely a competent lawyer could find arguments (acceptance etc.) or cut a deal with the prosecution to plead guilty if they think the trial goes south), that gives us a range of 108-135 months, around 10 years. I also found some rando on reddit that reaches the same range with a slightly different calculation. Tigraan^{Click here for my talk page ("private" contact)} 17:00, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

@Tigraan: Added per MOS:LEADCITE. The source is actually located at the end of the first paragraph in the Proceeding section, which is from the website of the Department of Justice. Cheers. —  Băng Tỏa  15:03, 4 December 2021 (UTC)

@Băng Tỏa: Your attempt is appreciated, but I feel you missed my point. I do not contest the statement itself, which is a simple true fact (so much that sourcing to the DOJ is ok even though it is not a neutral party in the dispute). My problem is that we are giving prominence to a meaningless number (the statutory maximum sentence) which bears no relationship to the actual likely sentence (under the USSG).

Yes, she could be sentenced to twenty years of jail time, but that is quite a remote possibility. She could also die of cardiovascular disease during the trial and therefore escape sentencing but we are not putting this (true) fact in the lead. We should not mechanically copy the media narrative of "up to [some big number]". Newspapers do this because (1) the bigger the number, the better-sold the paper, and (2) it is easier to look up the statutory maximum than do the USSG math. On Wikipedia, (1) does not apply and we can fix (2) by not mentioning anything at all if the guideline calculation has not been done. Tigraan^{Click here for my talk page ("private" contact)} 10:26, 6 December 2021 (UTC)

Plaintiff or prosecution?

The article says the remaining counts "may be retried at the discretion of the plaintiff or prosecution". Is the plaintiff in this case someone different from the prosecution? If so, who is the plaintiff? —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 18:30, 5 January 2022 (UTC)