When we last heard from Martin “Pharma Bro” Shkreli, the embattled pharmaceutical executive and venture capitalist was proclaiming that he really wasn’t the entitled and pompous jerk that he seemed to be on social media. Well, on Thursday, we got an indication that Pharma Bro really is an entitled and pompous jerk. At a congressional hearing, Shkreli acted like he didn’t have a care in the world.
Shkreli was the highest-profile witness at a House Oversight Committee hearing on recent price increases in the drug industry. It was triggered in large part by Shkreli’s decision to dramatically raise the price of two critical drugs–Daraprim, a critical antiparasitic drug given to AIDS patients, and benznidazole, an antiparasitic drug that treats Chagas disease, a disease that can cause potentially fatal heart problems. However, Shkreli is facing unrelated federal charges that he looted one of his former companies, Retrophin, to appease investors in his hedge fund.
For that reason, Shkreli opted to plead the Fifth to virtually every question asked of him. Watch here.
Shkreli did so on the advice of his new lawyer, Ben Brafman. Earlier this week, Brafman told Shkreli in no uncertain terms that he would resign unless Shkreli stopped talking to the press. He kept quiet even when Trey Gowdy of South Carolina assured him that not every question he might face could put him at risk for incriminating himself. Shkreli replied, “I intend to follow the advice of my counsel, not yours.”
I can’t begrudge Shkreli for that. Indeed, considering that Shkreli is staring down the barrel of up to 20 years in prison if convicted, I’m surprised someone didn’t tell him to clam up sooner. I do have to wonder, though–was his decision to plead the Fifth a tacit admission that he was hoping to use the profits from those drugs to pay his legal bills in the securities fraud case, as well as a civil suit Retrophin filed against him? If that was his plan, he’s already a dead loser. Within hours of his arrest, he had been pushed out of both of his companies–Turing Pharmaceuticals, owner of Deraphim, and KaloBios, which was in the process of buying the rights to benznidazole.
However, Shkreli acted as if he really wasn’t taking the hearing seriously. While Gowdy and the committee’s ranking member, Elijah Cummings of Maryland, kicked him up, down, sideways, and every direction inbetween for his behavior, Shkreli smirked, turned away from lawmakers, and played with his pencil. In a typical exchange, Cummings told Shkreli that he had a chance to be either “the poster boy for greedy drug company executives” or use his influence to “change the system.” Shkreli gave a disinterested smirk, and seemed to be about to burst out laughing.
When it became apparent that Shkreli wasn’t going to answer questions, committee chairman Jason Chaffetz of Utah excused him from the hearing. However, John Mica of Florida was so outraged with Shkreli’s behavior that he asked Chaffetz to hold Shkreli in contempt of Congress–which could have put him at risk for a year in jail. Chaffetz declined–probably because it would have been too easy to argue that Shkreli was being punished for invoking his constitutional rights.
After the hearing, Brafman defended his client’s behavior. Watch the press conference here.
Brafman claimed that Shkreli “did not intend to show any disrespect” at the hearing, and claimed his client’s behavior was “nervous energy.” But that seems hard to believe in light of this tweet from Shkreli himself.
https://twitter.com/MartinShkreli/status/695264859907317761
There may have been an imbecile in that room, Pharma Bro–but it definitely wasn’t anyone on the committee. If you acted the way you did today before a judge, the velocity with which you would be held in contempt would create quite the breeze. You demonstrated loud and clear why you are the most despised one-percenter in this country–except maybe for Donald Trump.
