A judge has sentenced Martin Shkreli, a former hedge fund manager, to seven years in prison after being convicted on securities fraud charges last year.
Shkreli, who fostered an image as an insouciant and irreverent young investor, was also ordered to pay $75,000 on to of the $7.36m in forfeiture previously ordered.
During the sentencing hearing, the 34-year-old known to the public for his frequent trolling critics on the Internet and his cocky nothing-can-touch-me attitude, uncharacteristically broke down in tears, pleading for a light sentence from the judge, apologising to investors, and swearing that he had learned his lesson.
"I'm not the same person I was. I know right from wrong. I know what it means to tell the truth and what it means to lie," he said, saying he bears sole responsibility for what he did. "I am terribly sorry I lost your trust. You deserve far better."
The seven year sentence is lighter than the 15 years that Assistant US Attorney Jacquelyn Kasulis had sought. Ms Kasulis, during the proceedings, said that Shkreli has "no respect whatsoever" for the law, or the court proceedings, and that his history of disrespect should be considered in his sentencing. The intense media scrutiny that has led to Shkreli being dubbed " the most hated man in America" is not why he deserved to go to prison, she said, his actions are.
"I also want to make clear that Mr Shkreli is not a child," she said. "Mr Shkreli is about to turn 35 years old, he's a man. He's not a teenager who just needs some mentoring. He is a man who needs to take responsibility for his actions."
Attorney Benjamin Brafman had argued for just 18 months in prison for his client. US District Judge Kiyo Matsumoto promised that the media circus Shkreli had managed to create for himself was not being considered in her deliberations.
"Whatever adverse media attention he has brought upon himself with his online presence is... not before me," she said.
Shkreli became notorious in America after he raised the price of the life saving drug Daraprim by 5,000 per cent overnight, leading to outrage from infectious disease doctors and advocates. While Shkreli would later claim that people without insurance would get the pill for just $1 each — he had raised the price from $13.50 a pill to $750 a pill — the massive increase in cost led him to be nicknamed "Pharma Bro", which is a moniker that has followed him ever since both online and in the media.
Before his arrest in December of 2015, Shkreli was also known for co-founding several hedge funds, including Elea Capital, MSMB Capital Management, and MSMB Healthcare. He was the CEO of the biotechnology firm Retrophin as well, and the founder and CEO of Turing Pharmaceuticals, which acquired the rights for Daraprim, allowing Shkreli to boost prices.
During Shkreli's trial last year, Mr Brafman argued that none of his investors had actually lost money from what the FBI had described as a Ponzi-like scheme, and that some of them had even turned a profit, and therefore none of his actions could actually be considered to be a crime.
The prosecution, meanwhile, said that he was "engaged in multiple schemes to ensnare investors through a web of lies and deceit".
While Shkreli broke down in tears Firday during his sentencing hearing, he showed little of that remorse or even self-awareness during the nearly two years following his arrest before his conviction late last year.
During that time, he captured headlines for continuing his lavish lifestyle, and for acting in a way that seemed almost designed to shock the media and their audiences.
That included frequently degrading the prosecutors in New Yorks' Eastern District with insults like calling them "junior varsity" compared to those in the Southern District just across the East River. Those comments, made during streams on his Facebook account, led prosecutors to request a gag order on the case, leading to Ms Matsumoto telling him that he could no longer speak to reporters in the courthouse or immediately outside of it.
Shkreli also stirred controversy by offering up $5,000 on Facebook to anybody who could provide him with a strand of former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, leading the judge to revoke his bail, saying that he had solicited an assault by posting the offer. Posts online were seen in some circles as an indicator that Shkreli was planning on cloning Ms Clinton somehow.
The $7.36m in forfeiture that Ms Matsumoto has ordered may also include his one-of-a-kind Wu-Tank Klan album "Once Upon a Time in Sholin", which Shkreli notably bought at an auction three years ago for $ 2 million. But, while Shkreli clearly felt it was worth the expense, experts have said that the album would likely go for much less than the figure Shkreli was willing to throw down on it.
The album's selling point three years ago, like Shkreli's promises to investors, was a bit overblown, it would seem.
