Smirking Shkreli pleads the Fifth at congressional hearing, dodges questions
US News
Smirking Shkreli pleads the Fifth at congressional hearing, dodges questions
Martin Shkreli, the usually outspoken “pharma bro,” suddenly went silent when it was time to be grilled on Capitol Hill. The 32-year-old former pharmaceutical executive repeatedly invoked his Fifth Amendment right not to testify during a brief, contentious congressional hearing Thursday morning. Shkreli, who gained notoriety for price-gouging HIV medication, grinned and squirmed uncomfortably as he declined to answer basic questions in a House oversight hearing on prescription drug prices.
Hard to accept that these imbeciles represent the people in our government.
Shkreli on Twitter moments after the hearing
Shkreli became an overnight villain in September 2015 when news broke that as CEO of Turing Pharmaceuticals he had obtained the license for a decades-old life-saving medication and jacked up the price by 5,500 percent — from $13.50 to $750 per pill. He left Turing in December after his arrest on charges of federal securities fraud. The brash entrepreneur and former hedge fund manager, who pleaded not guilty after his arrest, has been out on $5 million bail. The lawmakers were clearly irritated by Shkreli’s attitude and his refusal to provide any information or context as to why the drug’s price skyrocketed into the stratosphere overnight.
It’s not funny. People are dying and they are getting sicker.
Elijah Cummings, D-Md.
