It was Erika and she seemed badly shaken. She told me about the
man in the SUV, the address on the envelope, and the ultimatum from
Boies. I tried to calm her down. Yes, it was highly likely she was under
surveillance, I admitted. But I was sure that it had started only
recently and that Theranos had no proof she was one of my sources.
This was an attempt to smoke her out, I said. They were bluffing. I
encouraged her to ignore the letter and to go about her business as
usual. I could tell from her halting voice that she was still petrified, but
she agreed to follow my advice.
The next day, I received an email from Dr. Sundene in Phoenix. A
Theranos sales representative had come by her office to tell her that
the company’s president, Sunny Balwani, was in town and wanted to
meet with her. When she’d declined the invitation, he had turned
hostile and suggested that her refusal would have negative
consequences. I couldn’t believe it. Going after my confidential sources
was one thing, but threatening a doctor who had spoken to me on the
record was beyond the pale. I sent Heather King an email letting her
know that I was aware of the sales representative’s visit to Dr.
Sundene’s office and that, if I learned of any more such incidents, I
would consider them newsworthy and would include mention of them
in my story. King denied that the sales representative had done
anything wrong.
Far from backing off, Theranos stepped it up a notch. Later that
week, Boies sent the Journal a second letter. Unlike the first one,
which was just two pages long, this one ran twenty-three pages and
explicitly threatened a lawsuit if we published a story that defamed
Theranos or disclosed any of its trade secrets. Much of the letter was a
searing assault on my journalistic integrity. In the course of my
reporting, I had “fallen far short of being fair, objective, or impartial”
and instead appeared hell-bent on “producing a predetermined (and
false) narrative,” Boies wrote.
His main evidence to back up that argument was signed statements
Theranos had obtained from two of the other doctors I had spoken to
claiming I had mischaracterized what they had told me and hadn’t
made clear to them that I might use the information in a published