Did "Pharma Bro" Shkreli commit fraud? A jury now decides
The fate of "the most hated man in America" will soon be in a jury's hands.
The federal securities fraud trial of former pharmaceutical CEO Martin Shkreli is moving toward the decision-making phase, with jurors potentially starting their deliberations Monday.
On Friday, they heard closing arguments by prosecutors accusing Shkreli of looting his own drug company to pay back disgruntled investors in two failed hedge funds he ran.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Alixandra Smith said in closing arguments at his securities fraud trial that Shkreli "lied to investors to get their money into the funds and then lied to them so they wouldn't take it out."
The prosecutor recounted testimony by investors who told jurors that Shkreli claimed to be managing up to $40 million in one of his firms at a time when its brokerage account held only a few hundred dollars. When one investor asked for his money back, Shkreli stalled for months until he used a Ponzi-like scheme to secretly raid a second fund to return a portion of the funds, she said.
"The defendant was lying not only about the ability to get a redemption, but also about where that money was coming from," she said.
The defense insisted there were no victims because everyone got their original investments back and even made hefty profits.
The 34-year-old Shkreli is best known for jacking up the price of a life-saving drug by 5,000 percent and for trolling his critics online. Sometimes called "the most hated man in America," Shkreli didn't testify at his own trial, although he has maintained an active social media presence.
On Thursday, he took to Facebook to call the trial "a silly witch hunt."
