Martin Shkreli arrested on charges of securities fraud

I don’t exactly want to defend Martin Shkreli. But I’m a bit taken aback by the force of the internet’s hatred for the man. And it makes me want to treat the allegations against him — and they are, still, just allegations — with caution. A few thoughts:

1. Martin Shkreli is an unbelievable asshole on Twitter. But being an asshole on Twitter is not a crime. If it were a crime, America’s mass incarceration problem would get much, much worse.

Martin Shkreli, the drug company executive who shot to fame for arbitrarily increasing the cost of lifesaving drugs, was arrested for securities fraud today.

You can read the full indictment here:

Martin Shkreli became one of the most hated men on the internet back in September when he raised the price of an essential drug, Daraprim, more than 5,000 percent. Shkreli seemed to revel in his notoriety, firing taunts right back at people who attacked him on social media.

This morning, federal officials arrested the entrepreneur at his apartment in Manhattan. And it appears the charges have nothing to do with the Daraprim price hike that made him infamous online.

Pharmaceutical executive Martin Shkreli first became infamous for hiking one of his drug’s prices 5,000 percent overnight. This was, to many, appalling. But Shkreli isn’t the first drug executive to hike his price, and he won’t be the last. As Quartz reported in October, “Massive, unexpected drug price increases are happening all the time.“

What sets Shkreli apart — why the BBC has repeatedly dubbed him “the most hated man in America” — is his bombastic public personality. Shkreli is hyper-active on Twitter, where he regularly spars with followers. He boasts about his success, both professionally and personally. To scroll through his 7,000 tweets is to see a man who appears to derive great joy from pushing America’s buttons.

Martin Shkreli, the drug company CEO who became infamous for increasing the price of a generic lifesaving drug from $13.50 to $750 per pill, has been arrested for securities fraud, Bloomberg Businessweek is reporting.

Shkreli is accused of taking stock from a biotech company he founded and was later pushed out of, Retrophin, in order to pay off debts from another one of his businesses, a hedge fund that lost more than $7 million in 2011. Retrophin made similar allegations in a $65 million lawsuit against Shkreli filed in August.