Island Bookshelf: Exposing a healthcare con game

In 2015, Wall Street Journal reporter John Carreyrou was casting about for a new story to sink his teeth into.

He, along with several colleagues, had just won a Pulitzer Prize for a series of articles in the Journal exposing fraud and abuse in Medicare. Just about that time, whistle blowers were beginning to act on their concerns that Theranos, an incredibly successful Silicon Valley startup, was not able to deliver on its promised technology for painless, comprehensive blood testing. They reached out to Mr. Carreyrou, bringing him and themselves into the crosshairs of “a $9 billion Silicon Valley company with a litigious track record that was represented by David Boies,” as he writes in his book, “Bad Blood.”

Theranos’ founder, Elizabeth Holmes, a charismatic young entrepreneur, had styled herself as “the female Steve Jobs.” She garnered huge investments and amassed a board of luminaries, from former Secretarys of State George Shultz and Henry Kissinger to General James Mattis, who believed the technology had great potential for American troops wounded in battle.

The company was represented by one of the country’s most powerful litigators, David Boies, who pushed back hard against any suggestion that its technology failed to deliver as promised.

Eventually, though, Mr. Carreyrou’s reporting stripped away the façade that had enabled Theranos to sign up major partners like Safeway and Walgreen’s, who had begun to use its blood testing in their stores.  Not only was Theranos defrauding investors, it was delivering incorrect test results that jeopardized patients’ health and safety.

In March 2018, the Securities and Exchange Commission charged Theranos, Ms. Holmes and her partner Sunny Balwani with fraud. The company is now worthless. Ms. Holmes and Mr. Balwani will face trial on criminal charges next year. John Carreyrou’s coverage of Theranos in the Wall Street Journal has won George Polk, Gerald Loeb and Barlett & Steele awards.

Born in New York and raised in Paris, Mr. Carreyrou currently resides in Brooklyn with his wife, Molly, and three children, Sebastian, Jack and Francesca.

He has deep Shelter Island roots through his mother, Jane Evans Carreyrou, who spends winters in France with his father, Gérard Carreyrou, a noted French TV journalist, and summers on the Island.

“My mother was a teacher,” he said, “so when we were growing up we were able to spend all summer on Shelter Island.”

He and his sister Alexandra enjoyed the unhurried pace of Island life, barefoot days at the water’s edge with playmates who would become lifelong friends.

Now, he brings his family here for summer visits with his parents, not wanting to overwhelm their traditional Heights cottage. “We respect that as my mother’s domain,” he said.

Mr. Carreyrou is about to embark on a leave from the Journal until January in order to fulfill a growing number of speaking requests. There is a movie in the works, currently being written by Vanessa Taylor, who co-wrote “The Shape of Water.”

“She surprised me,” Mr. Carreyrou said, “with the extent to which she understood the plot and is not taking liberties with the book.”

Actress Jennifer Lawrence is set to play Elizabeth Holmes and co-produce.

Adam McKay, who often works with Will Ferrell, is directing. “I found out that one of Jennifer Lawrence’s favorite movies is ‘Stepbrothers,’ with Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly,” Mr. Carreyrou said.

In addition to this movie, an HBO documentary on Theranos will debut at the Sundance Film Festival in Utah in January. Mr. Carreyrou is cooperating with the film being made by Academy Award winner Alex Gibney, who also chronicled the fall of Enron and the inside story of Scientology.

The Theranos documentary is entitled “The Inventor,” with a double meaning, Mr. Carreyrou said. “There are inventors like Thomas Edison, who do develop new technology,” he said, “and then there are fabulists, who invent their own truth.”