[Hnrobert42]

5 years?! People can get that much for stealing a car or jewelry. She stole tens of millions! Not only that, she did it through fraud. It’s not like you can just build a higher fence. For the system to work, it must be free of fraud.

[bambax]

Fraud is different from theft. Fraud is manipulating consent. Theft is taking by force what isn't yours. I don't know why everyone seems to be conflating the two everywhere in this thread.

[marcusverus]

In this case, fraud is far worse than theft. She defrauded investors of hundreds of millions of dollars and spent them on a what was essentially a vanity project. She destroyed hundreds of millions of dollars of private property.

Destroying 100 million is best compared to something like a "killdozer"[0] rampage. Holmes' crime was the destructive equivalent of leveling ~300 homes.

[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Heemeyer#The_'Killdozer...

[spookthesunset]

Speaking of killdozer, there is an excellent podcast on this guy: https://swindledpodcast.com/podcasts/season-5/72-the-killdoz...

It was very lucky nobody was seriously injured by that thing.

[Hnrobert42]

I did not conflate them. I directly compared them.

In both theft and fraud, the victim is deprived of of something. That’s why people consider them similar crimes.

[bambax]

The question is not just the state of the victim, it is (mainly) the intent of the perpetrator and the means used. That's why you don't get the same sentence if you harm somebody by accident or if you meant to do it.

[blitzar]

Accidental death and murder both result in someone dead. They are not similar crimes.

[ryathal]

Accidental fraud generally isn't even a crime though...

[dahfizz]

They are not the _same_, but they are extremely similar. Do you think first and second degree murder charges are "similar"?

[369548684892826]

Feel pretty similar from the victim’s point of view.

[kube-system]

The sentiment that sentencing is justified by retribution is the number one reason why the US criminal justice system is messed up. The concept of right-and-wrong and mens rea are inextricably one.

[Jimmc414]

How would you exclude rear ending a car at a red light from that set?

[ryathal]

Intent. Both fraud and theft require intent, rear ending a car can happen regardless of intent, and would be a much more severe charge if there was intent.

[bufferoverflow]

No, you're confusing robbery and theft. Robbery is taking stuff by force.

[parineum]

> Grand Theft

> Grand theft includes theft of property with a value of more than $950 or theft of a firearm (any value). The penalty for stealing a firearm is a felony, punishable by a state prison term of 16 months, two years, or three years. In all other cases, grand theft is a wobbler and can be charged as a misdemeanor or felony. A misdemeanor sentence results in up to one year in jail and a felony sentence results in prison time of 16 months, two years, or three years. (Cal. Penal Code §§ 487, 490.2 (2020).)

You actually can't get that much time for stealing a car or jewelry. What gives a criminal that much time is that "theft" is often actually "robbery", which involves the use of coercive violence. Violence is generally punished much more harshly.

> California Penal Code 211 PC defines the crime of robbery as “the felonious taking of personal property in the possession of another, from his person or immediate presence, and against his will, accomplished by means of force or fear.” Robbery is a felony punishable by up to 9 years in state prison.

> First-degree robbery includes robbery of

> any driver or passenger on a bus, taxi, streetcar, subway, cable car, etc., any person in an inhabited structure, or any person who has just used an ATM and is still in the vicinity of the ATM.4

> First-degree robbery leads to a California state prison sentence of between three (3) and nine (9) years.5

[Hnrobert42]

While you may be correct, I am not sure your pedantry affects my point.

[parineum]

It's not pedantry. Those people who got "much more time" aren't there for taking money, they're there for pointing guns and knives at people. Threatening to take someone's life is much worse than actually taking some money.

[klik99]

Just on your last sentence: The ideal amount of fraud is not zero, the cost of checking everything is too high. I recommend the book “lying for money” which breaks down what fraud is and what that tells us about the overall system

[sgt101]

I think that there are two components in your argument, the personal harm element and social policing. The question for me is what responsibility and therefore forefit there should be on an individual for the social element. Interestingly it seems to me that the more libertarian folks are the harsher their view of punitive measures for social enforcement seems.

[whywhywhywhy]

Sometimes it's not all just about the monetary amount. Someone choosing to use the threat of violence or death on a single individual one time to even take as little as $20 doesn't belong in a society.

Even if you're lying to trick some companies and investors to give you millions you're still not as evil or dangerous to society as the person who chooses to terrorize individuals for their gain. The actions are what matters.

[richthegeek]

  “Do you understand what I'm saying?" shouted Moist. "You can't just go around killing people!"

  "Why Not? You Do." The golem lowered his arm.

  "What?" snapped Moist. "I do not! Who told you that?"

  "I Worked It Out. You Have Killed Two Point Three Three Eight People," said the golem calmly.

  "I have never laid a finger on anyone in my life, Mr Pump. I may be–– all the things you know I am, but I am not a killer! I have never so much as drawn a sword!"

  "No, You Have Not. But You Have Stolen, Embezzled, Defrauded And Swindled Without Discrimination, Mr Lipvig. You Have Ruined Businesses And Destroyed Jobs. When Banks Fail, It Is Seldom Bankers Who Starve. Your Actions Have Taken Money From Those Who Had Little Enough To Begin With. In A Myriad Small Ways You Have Hastened The Deaths Of Many. You Do Not Know Them. You Did Not See Them Bleed. But You Snatched Bread From Their Mouths And Tore Clothes From Their Backs. For Sport, Mr Lipvig. For Sport. For The Joy Of The Game.”

- Going Postal, Terry Prachett

Fraud is not a zero-victim crime and less than petty theft is. Just because the investors can 'afford' it, their losses are passed on to society eventually.

[neuronic]

She's ruined anyway, doesn't mean she should get life in prison but I know Americans tend to thrive on cruelty.

[CRConrad]

The reverse, that you are in effect advocating, amounts to letting the big fish get away with fleecing LOTS of people while coming down much harder on the small fry that robs one person at a time.

Also a very American way of thinking AFAICS.

[uncomputation]

Right, and it wasn’t cruel at all for her to put out medical devices she knew could and did produce false results for patients - in one case a false positive for HIV - solely for her own gain?

[ljm]

I think this is an interesting perspective because there have to be some unconscious biases at play to see these things so differently, even down to one person 'tricking some investors' and the other 'terrorizing individuals for their gain'. Furthermore, one of these people is 'more evil' and 'more dangerous'. In my own mind there's an element of classism involved because of how we see these two kinds of people so differently, and how we imagine them to live their lives.

In that sense, this CEO could be like the Sackler family - responsible for so much suffering across American society for the past decade or so, but because the scale is so large they've effectively abstracted themselves away from the evil and terror they are responsible for. The implication being that the opioid addict gets the full judgment of the law and society for terrorizing individuals to feed their addition, but the people who made the addiction possible get away with being tricksters. The only reason Elizabeth Holmes doesn't approach that level is because she and her startup got caught before they could release their fake products at scale, before the more serious consequences would begin.

If you ask me, I'd prefer to see both being held appropriately accountable, preferably in a way that encourages rehabilitation and not retribution or cruelty.

[CRConrad]

> but because the scale is so large

Above all, I think, because it's so diluted across a lot of people. To me, all these fraud-on-a-grand-scale-apologists are as naïve as Moist von Lipwig in the Pratchett quote in a sibling comment.

Personally, I'm with the gholem.

[jklinger410]

People are just making stuff up in this thread lmao