Shkreli, drug firm chief, arrested on charges of securities fraud

Agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation took the 32-year-old Mr. Shkreli into custody Thursday morning, according to a person familiar with the matter.

This is not the first time Shkreli’s past with Retrophin and MSMB have landed him in legal trouble.

Bloomberg said Shkreli’s lawyer and a spokesman for Retrophin didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.

Retrophin’s board earlier this year accused Shkreli in a lawsuit of using $65 million in company funds to repay MSMB investors who had lost money. At least two separate Congressional probes have been launched since September on the pricing issues of Daraprim, which had always been available as a generic drug used to treat toxoplasmosis in AIDS patients.

Martin Shkreli, the former hedge fund manager under fire for buying…

People also noted how ironic it was that Shkreli recently said he wanted to bail out rapper Bobby Shmurda, who’s in jail on charges of conspiracy to commit murder – among other things.

US Attorney Robert Capers said the Turing Pharmaceuticals chief executive – who was charged with securities fraud and conspiracy unrelated to the price hike – had “engaged in multiple schemes to ensnare investors through a web of lies and deceit”.

Although sharp criticism made Shkreli bring down prices on Daraprim for hospitals, he was his vociferous self, as he streamed his personal life on YouTube, and boasted about buying the one of a kind Wu-Tang Clan album for $2 million, only to be distanced by the hip hop group.

“If the government seizes the Wu-Tang album, does it run another auction, or just release it for free as part of our cultural patrimony?” asked @Matt_Levine. He allegedly helped Shkreli in on security fraud. Even 2016 presidential candidates have gotten in on the Shkreli hate: Donald Trump called Martin Shkreli a “spoiled brat”, and even the erratic Sen. But growing public backlash against that price has resulted in the entry of new competitors – compounding pharmacies able to produce similar versions for a fraction of the cost.

Shkreli said the company would cut the price of Daraprim.

Reuters witnessed Shkreli’s arrest at the Murray Hill Tower Apartments in midtown Manhattan. Last month, however, Turing reneged on its pledge.

Michael Perino, the Dean George W. Matheson Professor of Law at St. John’s University School of Law, noted that it was “pretty unusual” for the prosecutors to charge the attorney, which allows them to undercut’s Shkreli’s possible defense that he “relied in good faith on my counsel”, making this case more than the “plain vanilla securities fraud”.

In November, he gained control of another drug company, Kalobios Pharmaceuticals, whose stock price plummeted on news of his arrest, falling 53.24 percent to $11.03 before trading was suspended.