It’s Karmic Friday, folks!
www.washingtonpost.com/...
BREAKING: Martin Shkreli has been sentenced to seven years in prison for defrauding investors, U.S. District Judge Kiyo Matsumoto roughly splitting the difference between what prosecutors and defense attorneys had asked for. The former hedge fund manager showed little reaction to the sentence. He will receive credit for the six months he has served while awaiting sentencing. This file will be updated.
But before he got himself convicted for fraud, you may recall that this was the piece of human filth who jacked up prices of a lifesaving AIDS medication by 5,000 percent just because…..well, because he could.
Shkreli, 34, best known for raising the price of an AIDS drug by 5,000 percent when he was chief executive of Turing Pharmaceuticals, was convicted by a Brooklyn jury in August of defrauding the investors in his hedge funds. Shkreli lied to obtain investors’ money, then didn’t tell them when he made a bad stock bet that led to massive losses, prosecutors argued. Instead, they said, he raised more money to pay off other investors, or took money and stock from Retrophin, a drug company that he was running.
Interesting that he feels simply awful about defrauding his investors. I wonder how badly he feels about having caused AIDS patients to die when they couldn’t afford the medication his company made?
Martin Shkreli told a federal court that he understands his mistakes and begged forgiveness from the investors he lied to, saying, “I am terribly sorry I lost your trust. You deserved far better.”
He choked back tears as he addressed Judge Kiyo Matsumoto, who will impose a sentence at the end of Friday’s hearing in Brooklyn, N.Y. He was convicted in August of lying to investors in his hedge funds and manipulating shares in the biotech company he founded. The prosecution has recommended he serve 15 years, while his defense team has said a shorter term is warranted.
There’s also that thing about hubris.
Even after his arrest in 2015, Shkreli went against his lawyers' advice to lay low by taunting authorities in Facebook posts. And after his conviction last year, the judge revoked his bail and jailed him when he said he would pay a $5,000 bounty to anyone who could get a lock of Hillary Clinton's hair while the Democrat was on a book tour.
If there’s anything that should bring us together as a country, it would be this.