NEW YORK (Reuters) - Martin Shkreli, known for once hiking the price of a life-saving drug more than 4,000%, cannot return to the pharmaceutical industry after a federal appeals court on Tuesday upheld his lifetime ban.
A three-judge panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan said a lower court judge acted properly in imposing the ban and ordering Shkreli to repay $64.6 million because of his antitrust violations.
The case had been brought by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC), joined by New York, California, Illinois, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia.
Shkreli, 40, became notorious and gained the sobriquet “Pharma Bro” when, as chief executive of Turing Pharmaceuticals in 2015, he raised the price of the newly-acquired antiparasitic drug Daraprim overnight to $750 per tablet from $17.50.
That’s all true but it’s also important to not dismiss his drug company culpability in the whole thing. They would fire him, and attack him only because he at that point was massive PR problem, not for any kind of attempt at accepting responsibility. If he wasn’t such a public asshole they would give him raise and bonuses, board membership, maybe even say he is on the way to be the CEO, he would be their favourite corporate jackass.
No one dismissed his drug company’s culpability in anything here. The company paid $40M of his penalties since it was, after all, his company.