and I discussed these revelations and quickly went to work on a
follow-up story for the next day’s paper.
A few hours later, I was standing over the shoulder of the page-one
editor who was handling my new story when Holmes’s face appeared
on a nearby TV tuned to CNBC. We took a break from the edit and
turned up the volume. Dressed in her usual all-black attire and
sporting a strained smile, she played the role of the visionary Silicon
Valley innovator who was being smeared by entrenched interests
trying to thwart progress. “This is what happens when you work to
change things,” she said. “First they think you’re crazy, then they fight
you, and then all of a sudden you change the world.” But, when Jim
Cramer asked her about specific elements of the article, such as the
company’s use of third-party analyzers for most of its tests, she turned
defensive and gave evasive and misleading answers.
I had sent Heather King an email earlier in the day to let her know I
was working on a second story and to request a Theranos comment
about the things I was going to report. King hadn’t replied. I now knew
why: toward the end of her interview with Cramer, Holmes dropped
mention of the nanotainer withdrawal and spun it as a voluntary
decision. She was trying to get ahead of my scoop.
We quickly published my follow-up piece online. Setting the record
straight, it revealed that the FDA had forced the company to stop
testing blood drawn from patients’ fingers and declared its nanotainer
an “unapproved medical device.” The story made the front page of the
paper’s print edition the next morning, providing more fuel to what
was now a full-blown scandal.
—
HOLMES WASN’T IN Palo Alto the day our first story was published. She
was attending a meeting of Harvard Medical School’s board of fellows.
She did her CNBC interview that evening from Boston. It wasn’t until
the next day that she flew back to California to address the growing
crisis.
Theranos had issued a second press release that morning that