Jury Selection in Martin Shkreli Trial Begins With Name Calling<br />By STEPHANIE CLIFFORDJUNE 26, 2017<br />A number of potential jurors in the fraud trial of Martin Shkreli were dismissed in quick succession on Monday morning<br />after calling the defendant “a snake,” “the most hated man in America” and “the face of corporate greed.”<br />Mr. Shkreli is on trial at the Federal District Court in Brooklyn, charged with eight counts of securities and wire fraud.<br />After the potential juror had stepped down, Benjamin Brafman, a lawyer for Mr. Shkreli, said, “So much for the presumption of innocence.”<br />The potential jurors were questioned at a sidebar with Judge Matsumoto, defense lawyers, prosecutors and one reporter from a news pool.<br />“A person that puts profit over everything else?”<br />When Judge Matsumoto told prospective jurors that Mr. Shkreli’s work in pharmaceuticals<br />was not on trial, the prosecutor Alixandra Smith corrected her.<br />The negative comments built up to the point that Mr. Brafman began to signal to Judge Matsumoto when potential jurors had said enough<br />that he could challenge them for cause, to stop them from going “on a tirade against Mr. Shkreli<br />“The price has been going up in the last few years, so they can’t afford their drugs,” the prospective juror said of his parents.<br />Several potential jurors on Monday blamed Mr. Shkreli broadly for the problems of the pharmaceutical industry.
