Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup

At trial, Richard Fuisz, his finances stretched thin by the lawsuit with Theranos, selects his son Joe, a patent attorney, as counsel. No longer able to call on Ian Gibbons’ testimony, and outgunned in trial by Boies—who caught Fuisz in several lies while he was on the stand—Fuisz and Joe finally gave up and agreed to withdraw the offending patent. Fuisz’s other son, John, who had been scheduled to testify to clear his own name, was angry with the result and threatened to sue everyone involved, including his father. Boies replied, “Those who the gods would destroy, they first make mad" (205).

Fortune magazine reporter Roger Parloff investigated the court case but set it aside for the more interesting story of Theranos itself. Parloff conducted a lengthy interview of Elizabeth and talked to several board members. His article in the June 2014 edition, with a picture of her on the cover, “vaulted Elizabeth to instant stardom" (208). Other magazines and news media picked up the story, and soon she was basking in the limelight, increasing her security entourage, and generally enjoying the perks of celebrity, with a chef to prepare her lunches and a Gulfstream jet to whisk her to events.