Pharma Bro Martin Shkreli Gets Trial Date, Couldn’t Wait to Play Pokémon Go After Hearing

Pharma Bro Martin Shkreli Gets Trial Date, Couldn’t Wait to Play Pokémon Go After Hearing July 15, 2016
By Alex Keown, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff

NEW YORK – Martin Shkreli will finally have his day in court. The disgraced former pharmaceutical entrepreneur face a judge in June 2017, Reuters reported this morning.

A trial date of June 26, 2017 was set for Shkreli, who faces multiple charges of federal securities trade fraud. Although he became a lightning rod of criticism during his time helming Turing Pharmaceuticals for a 5,000 percent price increase of the 65-year-old toxoplasmosis drug, daraprim, Shkreli was ultimately brought down from his time spent as a hedge fund manager. Reuters noted the prosecution sought a trial date in February 2017, but Shkreli’s attorney was successful in securing a later date due to schedule conflicts as well as “complex motions” he plans to file regarding Shkreli’s case.

Following the judge’s ruling, Shkreli reportedly asked if he could “play Pokemon Go now,” the viral video game that’s taken the nation by storm. However, in typical Shkreli style, he took to mocking the press on his Twitter page for reporting the Pokemon Go comment.

“The road [to] the Pulitzer is paved with Pokemon scoops,” Shkreli tweeted Thursday afternoon.

Martin Shkreli Gets Trial Date, Couldn't Wait to Play Pokemon Go After Hearing

In responding to a Tweet from The Street’s biotech reporter Adam Feuerstein, Shkreli said the reporter could catch a Pokemon at the headquarters of CNBC, which he referred to as “The Cartoon Network.”

Shkreli was charged by federal authorities on Dec. 17. The seven count indictment against Shkreli included multiple charges of securities fraud, securities fraud conspiracy and wire fraud conspiracy. U.S. Attorney Robert Capers accused Shkreli of running his former company Retrophin Pharmaceuticals s and his former hedge fund MSMB Capital Management like a “Ponzi scheme.” The indictment said Shkreli’s scheme, which caused his investors to suffer a loss of more than $11 million, was carried out over a five-year period, from 2009 to 2014. At the time of his arrest, Shkreli was helming two different pharmaceutical companies, Turing Pharmaceuticals, a company he founded last year and California-based KaloBios , a company he acquired a majority stake in in November 2015. Following his arrest Shkreli resigned as CEO of Turing and was terminated as CEO of KaloBios by that company’s board of directors. KaloBios is now seeking to buy back Shkreli’s common stock shares as part of a plan to distance itself from Shkreli.

Also scheduled to be tried along with Shkreli is Evan Greebel, a former lawyer for Retrophin Inc., a pharmaceutical company that Shkreli founded and ran until his ouster in 2014. Shkreli’s attorney, Benjamin Brafman, told Reuters he hoped to have Greebel and Shkreli’s tried separately, as part of Shkreli’s defense hinges on legal advice Greebel allegedly provided him with.

In August 2015, Retrophin sued Shkreli for $65 million over his use of company funds while helming that company. In its lawsuit, Retrophin said Shkreli breached his duty of loyalty to the biopharmaceutical company and he engaged in self-dealing and also seeks disgorgement of money paid to him. Retrophin said Shkreli used company funds for personal use, enriched himself through false consulting contracts and referred to Shkreli as “the paradigm faithless servant” who “is not entitled to compensation or post-separation benefits.”

The case is U.S. v. Shkreli, U.S. District Court, Eastern District of New York, No. 15-cr-00637.

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