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'Pharma Bro' Martin Shkreli Found Guilty of 3 of 8 Charges, Including Securities Fraud (cnbc.com)

Former pharmaceutical chief executive Martin Shkreli has been found guilty of securities fraud. A New York City jury returned the verdict after five days of deliberations. From a report: Shkreli, 34, was convicted of some of the eight criminal counts that he had faced, which had included securities fraud and conspiracy to commit both securities fraud and wire fraud, after a more-than-month-long trial in Brooklyn, New York, federal court. Of the eight counts, Shkreli was found guilty of three. Those included conspiracy to commit securities fraud, and two counts of securities fraud. He was found not guilty of five counts, including those related to wire fraud. He faces up to 20 years in prison when he is sentenced.

29 of 146 comments (clear)

  1. Bro, say it ain't so! by Spy+Handler · · Score: 3, Funny

    and...

    Bro, do u even lift (in prison)

    1. Re:Bro, say it ain't so! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      (Movie guy voice) They were two awesome bros, with more money than Midas when fate threw them a curve ball... Now they are Bunkees in a federal prison. Watch as they learn to Laugh and Love while serving time and being bitches.
      Bunkees soon to appear on YouTube.

  2. How sad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Couldn't have happened to a nicer guy.

    1. Re:How sad by jwhyche · · Score: 4, Informative

      Isn't Karma a bitch?

      --
      I read at +2. If your post doesn't reach that level I will not see or respond to it.
  3. Re:Betteridge's Law of Headlines by Kierthos · · Score: 2, Funny

    I think you're on the wrong article, Betteridge-bro.

    --
    Mr. Hu is not a ninja.
  4. Should have been all 8 charges by rahvin112 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The guy ran a ponzi scheme, at points when he was claiming $100million in fund assets when he only had $1000 in the funds account. In the end he stole money from his new company's investors to pay off the fund investors he'd cheated so they wouldn't go to the cops.

    I bet the jury didn't convict him on the charges because his investors were made whole by the second theft. But when you commit a crime like he did it doesn't matter if you eventually make them whole, you commit the crime when you lie and commit fraud. I don't know if the court didn't explain this well enough to the jury or what, but the man defrauded hundreds of people, then stole money from Retrophin to pay back the investors from his failed hedge fund. He's no better than Madoff and he should go to jail for YEARS and be bared from any type of job in involving managing money including a cashier at the local grocery store.

    He's a dumpster fire of a human being and he broke the law and should do the time. I hope he spends a whole lot of time in a 8x10 cell all by himself.

    1. Re:Should have been all 8 charges by liquid_schwartz · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I completely disagree. He should not spend a whole lot of time in an 8 x 10 cell by himself.

      Shkreli should spend a whole lot of time in an 8 x 10 cell with a 300-pound oversexed lifer who's hung like a donkey.

      While Shkreli no doubt deserves a ton of punishment relying on prison inmates to mete out justice really speaks to the inadequacy of our "justice" system. Criminals are far more likely to prey on the weak than on the deserving. Since about half of all rapes occur while in the government's possession the best way to combat rape is to reduce this. There is literally no better place to start in terms of numbers.

      citations:

      http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new...

    2. Re:Should have been all 8 charges by rtb61 · · Score: 2

      Always, always, rehabilitation first and punishment last. Even animal trainers know this, let alone people we are relying to retrain people into being good citizens. Only one real hard bite when it comes to rehabilitation first, no rehabilitation, no release. So you need better standard cells, more compassionate containment for those who can not be rehabilitated and thus should not be released, rather than a set punishment term.

      Logically prison should be altered to be prisons within a prison. So prison more like a class room, with say 25 offenders per and those are the only offenders they deal with for the duration of their stay. Isolated training classes of a maximum 25 residents per group, with zero interaction with other residents, prisons of 25 which are much easier to control and where real rehabilitation can take place. No more prison wide riots, just a maximum of 25 residents to deal with at any one time, which can easily brought under control by correctional services officers (people with minimum 2 year university degrees, trained to train). The entire prison would house thousands but each group would be restricted to contact only within that group and be isolated from all other groups housed in that facility. Basically school for dangerous adults, each classroom isolated and tightly controlled, there is a real duty of care to ensure residents are protected from negative interactions with other residents.

      --
      Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
  5. Brought it down on himself by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 4, Informative

    This is the Mr. Shkreli who Daraprim from $13.50 to $750/pill. Daraprim is an antiparasitic drug, used to treat pneumonia in conjunction with HIV, toxoplasmosis (sometimes called "mad cat lady disease") and another really nasty parasitic disease.

    When you do stuff like that, people look really closely at whatever else you are doing.

    It also led Imprimis to make a $1/pill replacement for the drug.

    1. Re:Brought it down on himself by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 2

      that should say "raised the price of Diaprim" ...

    2. Re:Brought it down on himself by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Most of the elected representatives are my age or older. I went to school with kids who had been injured by thalidomide (hi Anthony, wherever you are!) They are going to be very careful about pharma.

      And yes, the pharma companies have the best government they could buy, I can't deny that either.

      I am fine with drug imports if they are what they say they are, and are made with compliance to health-based standards. But somebody has to audit all of them. There is no shortage of quacks and thieves.

    3. Re:Brought it down on himself by ItsJustAPseudonym · · Score: 2

      Actually, I think Shkreli's actions are sufficiently notorious that "Daraprim" should qualify as a new verb, meaning "profit-mongering using legal and morally-abhorrent methods".

    4. Re:Brought it down on himself by liquid_schwartz · · Score: 3, Informative

      Most of the elected representatives are my age or older. I went to school with kids who had been injured by thalidomide (hi Anthony, wherever you are!) They are going to be very careful about pharma.

      And yes, the pharma companies have the best government they could buy, I can't deny that either.

      I am fine with drug imports if they are what they say they are, and are made with compliance to health-based standards. But somebody has to audit all of them. There is no shortage of quacks and thieves.

      Simply get them directly from Canada or another 1st world country. This isn't as hard as it's made out to be if we look for solutions instead of excuses.

    5. Re:Brought it down on himself by GameboyRMH · · Score: 2

      But the new verb should be "to Shkreli." Daraprim did nothing wtrong.

      --
      "When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
  6. I'll believe it when I see it by Dutchmaan · · Score: 5, Insightful

    He'll be out of prison in under 5 years and go right back to do all the things that made him rich at the expense of other people... He's rich and white... and our justice system is baby soft on white collar criminals.

  7. Rules For Getting Away With Stealing by IonOtter · · Score: 5, Insightful

    1: NEVER STEAL FROM RICH PEOPLE. Only steal from middle-class and below.

    2. If you're still going to steal from rich people, make sure they're not white.

    3. If you obey rules 1 & 2, don't be such a pulsating rectal cyst that even rich white people hate you.

    --
    [End Of Line]
    1. Re:Rules For Getting Away With Stealing by swb · · Score: 2

      Well, he almost saved it -- he stole from rich people, but ultimately he made them a profit.

      Really, if the securities issues was *all* he had done, I think he wouldn't ever have been charged with anything under a kind of "no harm, no foul" mindset. My guess is that the kind of thing he did probably happens all the time, especially in small funds run by inexperienced or aggressive fund managers. The ones that manage to cover it all get away with.

      But no, he had to be a complete asshole, both as a human being and as a drug company manager.

  8. Video by techsoldaten · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I heard his interview after the verdicts were announced:

    https://www.washingtonpost.com...

    Very proud of the return for investors. Plans to keep working on the remaining counts, this will likely end up being appealed.

    I actually believe this was all a marketing campaign for him personally. The fact he's still in some form of legal jeopardy doesn't seem to phase him much.

    He recognized that the costs of a necessary medicine are paid by insurance companies that gouge in other areas as well, and promoted the hell out of that fact. There's a part of me that wants to say this is some form of corporate theater, and he's auditioning for a much larger part in exploiting the financial system.

  9. Re:Woot. by Frosty+Piss · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I'm afraid this is one of those we don't have a law related to this guy doing things that are legal but morally wrong so we're going to pick through everything until we can find something to nail him with.

    So what? He committed the crimes he was convicted of, none of which are minor crimes. The prosecutors used the tools available to them to take a piece of shit who doesn't belong in a civilized society and put him in a place where he will perhaps learn some humility. Oh who am I kidding, I hope he bunks with an HIV+ weight lifter that likes cute "bros".

    --
    If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
  10. Re:Woot. by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 4, Insightful

    People should not go to prison just because they're assholes.

    But that would be a better world than one in which the prisons are filled with people who smoked some weed or took one of Grandpa's pain pills.

  11. Re: Woot. by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 2

    Patents are best friends to monopolies.

    No patent was involved here. Daraprim was a generic that anyone can make.

  12. Re:Hey Martin!! by PolygamousRanchKid+ · · Score: 2

    Don't drop the soap BRO!!

    I seriously doubt if he will ever see the inside of a prison.

    He "faces" up to 20 years in prison sentences, but will find some legal folks to help him drag this on longer than the IBM-SCO-Linux lawsuit.

    He'll cut some deal, maybe by ratting out some other folks, and will end up with a suspended sentence.

    --
    Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
  13. Re:Woot. by AdamStarks · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I hate Shkreli as much as the next internet person, but let's not wish rape on the guy. "Cruel and unusual punishment" is explicitly rejected by our justice system, the integrity of which is already shaky enough. For everyone like this guy that's "earned it", there's another in that same situation who was wrongfully convicted, and is now being doubly punished.

  14. Re:Woot. by Frosty+Piss · · Score: 2

    I hate Shkreli as much as the next internet person, but let's not wish rape on the guy.

    Why not? His actions with respect to how he has marketed the pharmaceuticals he controls have caused much pain and suffering for many many people. His punishment must punative.

    --
    If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
  15. Re:Woot. by thegarbz · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Yes he's an asshole but it doesn't make it any less of a dangerous road to be going down.

    How is convicting someone of a crime he committed a dangerous road?
    How does the date someone started investigating him for securities fraud make a difference?

    On the flip side, if someone just makes a silly amount of money after jacking up the prices of one of their product, what makes you think they won't get looked at to see if there isn't securities fraud going on?

    This seems like perfectly reasonable effect of a functioning society at work.

  16. Re:Woot. by JohnFen · · Score: 2

    I don't wish rape or other abuse on anyone, even a scumbag like this.

    But considering the (metaphorical, but not less harmful) raping that he engaged in, the phrase "live by the sword, die by the sword" did pop into my mind.

  17. Re:Woot. by JohnFen · · Score: 5, Informative

    Because the goal of the justice system is supposed to be justice, not vengeance.

  18. Re:Woot. by darthsilun · · Score: 2

    For everyone like this guy that's "earned it", there's another in that same situation who was wrongfully convicted, and is now being doubly punished.

    I'd like to think that the number of wrongfully convicted people in prison is very small.

    If half our prison population were wrongfully convicted, then there's something seriously wrong.

    And before you reply that it's true, I hope you've got a citation for it to go along with it. And not a citation from Breitbart.

  19. Re:Woot. by AdamStarks · · Score: 2

    What's that old quote about "I'd rather a hundred guilty men go free than 1 innocent man be imprisoned"?

    Hoping that Shkreli gets raped really means hoping that he ends up in a penitentiary where violent and aggressive inmates aren't dealt with and guards let their personal feelings get in the way of their professional duties. And if such a penitentiary exists, who's to say that some of those 1 in a 100 innocents don't go there? I'm not saying that's the actual number or anything, and duh those places exist, but I'd rather spend my hope on the idea that they don't.

    If he really, truly deserves rape, then call your local congress-critter and propose a bill legalizing it as a form of punishment for the most serious of the charges Shkreli was charged with. If you're not comfortable with that same punishment being meted out against other people found guilty of the same crime (regardless of any other circumstances, including the blue-moon chance of actual innocence), then fuck off.