What I didn’t realize then was that he did take my reporting seriously…eventually.ĭays after I published that piece, he did something wildly unwise for anyone who might possibly be the target of a criminal probe: He trekked down to the U.S. I didn’t hear from him again until almost exactly a year later, after his arrest. He tweeted later that I had "confused a situation that was no longer relevant." I wrote down his infuriated reaction, and added it to my piece. I told him politely but firmly that I was sure the information was correct, and I would be running the story. He had many enemies, and I would be a fool to trust any of them, he assured me. He asked me who told me about the criminal probe I refused to answer. He had already moved on - after being ousted as CEO by the Retrophin board - and had started a new drug company, Turing.
He was sorry to tell me that I had “no story.” Yes, there was trouble at his first pharmaceutical company, Retrophin, but that was old news. “Hi, this is Martin Shkreli,” he announced when I answered my cell phone. I hadn’t anticipated that he, and not a lawyer or some crisis PR representative, would call me back. Before publishing a story about the investigation, I did what was ethically required and reached out to him for comment. I was a legal reporter for Bloomberg at the time, and I had gotten a tip that the feds were looking into him for fraud. It was still many months before his company Turing Pharmaceuticals would hike the price of a toxoplasmosis treatment, Daraprim, by 5,000% - turning him overnight into a global symbol of a greed, the “Pharma Bro,” and the “most hated man in America,” even though he pledged to guarantee access to the treatment and use the profits to research new cures. He was still a virtual unknown outside of hedge fund, trader and biotech circles.
That was clear from the very first conversation I had with him. Martin Shkreli was always eager to talk, even when it wasn’t in his best interest.
The following is an excerpt from a memoir and should be viewed as opinion.
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