US Prosecutors Ask Judge To Silence Shkreli During Trial

Federal prosecutors asked a judge to impose a gag order on Martin Shkreli during his securities fraud trial in Brooklyn in July 2017, after the so-called “Pharma Bro” made a series of provocative public comments about the case.

The request came after Shkreli, then 34, walked into a courtroom full of reporters during a lunch break and began sharing his opinions about the proceedings. At one point, he called the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of New York “junior varsity.”

In their motion, prosecutors accused Shkreli of running a “campaign of disruption” through comments to the press and on social media, making “a spectacle of himself and the trial.” They also alleged that Shkreli had been using an anonymous Twitter account to comment on the trial in real time.

U.S. District Judge Kiyo Matsumoto sided with prosecutors. “All your client has to do is stop talking in the courthouse and around the perimeter of the courthouse,” Matsumoto told the defense. She added, “I was shocked that there were these comments, these statements,” and warned that there was “a great risk jurors will be exposed” to Shkreli’s public commentary.

Shkreli’s attorney, Benjamin Brafman, responded by accusing the media of trying to “bait” his client, whom he described as being in a “frail emotional state” and attempting to defend himself against “one-sided coverage.” Brafman assured the judge, “There will be no more commenting by Mr. Shkreli.”

In a notable development during the same hearing, prosecutors revealed that Shkreli’s defense team had approached them multiple times about a possible guilty plea to avoid trial — contradicting Shkreli’s public claims that he had never considered a plea deal.

Shkreli had gained national notoriety in 2015 after his company, Turing Pharmaceuticals, raised the price of the anti-parasitic drug Daraprim from $13.50 to $750 per pill. The fraud charges against him were unrelated to the drug pricing controversy and instead centered on allegations that he defrauded investors in two hedge funds.

He was ultimately convicted on multiple counts later in 2017 and sentenced to seven years in federal prison in 2018.