--- title: Martin Shkreli Mocks Congress During Hearing description: Martin Shkreli, the former chief executive of Turing, smirked at the House Oversight Committee hearing on the rising costs of drugs. canonical: https://time.com/4207931/martin-shkreli-congress-turing-pharmaceuticals-hearing/ author: Haley Sweetland Edwards article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-02-04T17:11:09.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-10-05T08:41:03.838Z article:section: Politics og:title: Pharma 'Bad Boy' Martin Shkreli Mocks Congress og:description: Shkreli smirked, mugged for the camera, and refused to answer lawmakers' questions og:url: https://time.com/4207931/martin-shkreli-congress-turing-pharmaceuticals-hearing/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt17ced0a75d9a2375/69887c293c16397ac245be22/martin-shkreli2.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 4500 og:image:height: 2531 og:image:alt: Entrepreneur and pharmaceutical executive Martin Shkreli waits for a car to pick him up after invoking his Fifth Amendment rights during a hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Capitol Hill Feb. 4, 2016 in Washington. og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Pharma 'Bad Boy' Martin Shkreli Mocks Congress twitter:description: Shkreli smirked, mugged for the camera, and refused to answer lawmakers' questions twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt17ced0a75d9a2375/69887c293c16397ac245be22/martin-shkreli2.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 video:duration: 01:43 video:published: 2016-02-04 section: politics topics: congressional hearing, Fifth Amendment, drug prices, price increases, pharmaceutical industry, corporate accountability, self-incrimination, Ponzi scheme comparison genre: hearing footage, news tones: confrontational, accusatory, tense, formal emotions: anger (medium), frustration (medium), defiance (medium) sentiment: negative audience: policy followers, healthcare professionals, general news audiences, investors people: Martin Shkreli organizations: Congress, House Committee products: Daraprim content_suitability: health controversy [00:38-00:45]; crime [00:01-00:20]; politics [00:00-01:43] transcript_source: publisher captions transcript_reviewed: not applicable ---  # Pharma 'Bad Boy' Martin Shkreli Mocks Congress > Sponsored content. 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It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, twice a week. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3/newsletters?i=a5d78e4e-6dd4-4870-98f9-8d68e570b5a4&cr=time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3-v1) ## Video: TIME Raw: Drug CEO Martin Shkreli Invokes 5th Amendment at Congressional Hearing [Watch (HLS stream): TIME Raw: Drug CEO Martin Shkreli Invokes 5th Amendment at Congressional Hearing](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/xBgVNFBO.m3u8) (1:43)  _Published 2016-02-04. Shkreli he testifies before Congress on drug prices_ Description, summary, key points, chapters, key quotes, questions and transcript, where present, were produced automatically from the video or its captions and were not reviewed. ## Summary A congressional hearing features a witness who invokes his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination and declines to answer questions. A committee member questions whether revenues from Daraprim are being used to fund further acquisitions and price increases on future drugs. The witness is urged to change the system, and the committee excuses him from the table after he confirms he will not answer questions. ## Key points - The witness invokes the Fifth Amendment on the advice of counsel and respectfully declines to answer the question. (00:01) - A committee member says the witness has the ability to decline answers and that not all answers would subject him to incrimination. (00:06) - The witness states he intends to follow the advice of his counsel, not the committee member's. (00:20) - A member compares the company's conduct to a Ponzi scheme, suggesting revenues from Daraprim may fund acquisitions of drugs followed by massive price increases. (00:22) - The committee member states that people are dying and getting sicker as a result of the pricing. (00:38) - The witness is told he could go down in history as a poster boy for greedy drug company executives, or change the system. (00:45) - The committee member says the witness has detailed knowledge about drug companies and the system and could become a force of tremendous good. (00:58) - The witness confirms he will decline all answers and invoke the Fifth Amendment, and the committee excuses him from the table. (01:20) ## Chapters - [00:00 to 00:20] Witness invokes Fifth Amendment. The witness declines to answer questions on the advice of counsel, citing the privilege against self-incrimination. - [00:20 to 00:45] Committee questions drug price practices. A committee member accuses the company of a Ponzi-like pattern of price increases and says people are being harmed. - [00:45 to 01:12] Appeal to change the system. The committee member urges the witness to change the system rather than become a symbol of greedy executives. - [01:12 to 01:43] Witness confirms refusal and is excused. The witness confirms he will decline all answers, and the committee excuses him from the table. ## Key quotes - [00:01] witness: "On the advice of counsel I invoke the fifth amendment." - [00:20] witness: "I intend to follow the advice of my counsel, not yours." - [00:22] interviewer: "Like a Ponzi scheme, it appears that Deterring may be using revenues from Diafram to research and identify the next drug that it will acquire" - [00:38] interviewer: "people are dying, and they are getting sicker and sicker." - [00:45] interviewer: "The way I see it you can go down in history as the poster boy For greedy drug company executives, or you can change the system." ## Questions this video answers - Will the witness answer questions from the committee? [01:20] - Is the witness aware that not all answers would subject him to incrimination? [00:06] - Is the company using revenues from one drug to fund acquisitions of others with large price increases? [00:22] - Can the witness change the drug pricing system and avoid being remembered as a greedy executive? [00:45] ## Content suitability - health controversy [00:38-00:45]: Claims that people are dying and getting sicker due to drug pricing. - crime [00:01-00:20]: References to self-incrimination and a Ponzi scheme comparison. - politics [00:00-01:43]: Congressional hearing on drug pricing.  by [Haley Sweetland Edwards](https://time.com/author/haley-sweetland-edwards/)  ## Haley Sweetland Edwards Feb 4, 2016 5:11 PM UTC Shkreli he testifies before Congress on drug prices  by [Haley Sweetland Edwards](https://time.com/author/haley-sweetland-edwards/)  ## Haley Sweetland Edwards Feb 4, 2016 5:11 PM UTC [Martin Shkreli](http://time.com/4153512/martin-shkreli-pharmaceuticals-arrested-turing-daraprim/), the former chief executive of Turing Pharmaceuticals who catapulted into notoriety last year after [rapidly increasing the price of a life-saving drug by 5,000%](http://time.com/4042897/daraprim-drug-price/), made a mockery Thursday of [a House Oversight Committee hearing](http://time.com/4207829/martin-shrkeli-fifth-hearing/) on the rising price of drugs. During the [marathon hearing](https://oversight.house.gov/hearing/developments-in-the-prescription-drug-market-oversight/), Shkreli smirked, mugged for the camera, and refused to answer lawmakers’ questions on the grounds that doing so would incriminate him in [an upcoming criminal trial](http://time.com/4153113/ceo-arrested-for-securities-fraud/). Less than an hour after being escorted from the House, Shkreli [mocked the lawmakers on Twitter](https://twitter.com/MartinShkreli/status/695264859907317761). “Hard to accept that these imbeciles represent the people in our government,” he wrote. South Carolina Rep. Trey Gowdy, the Republican committee chairman, said he was “vexed” by Shkreli’s repeated statement that he was invoking his constitutional right to “plead the Fifth,” and reminded the 32-year-old multi-millionaire that he could answer questions that didn’t have to do with his trial. Shkreli smirked. “I intend to follow the advice of my counsel, not yours,” he said, twice. Later, Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings, the ranking Democrat on the committee, begged Shkreli to use his position, both as an influential shareholder at Turing and as an increasingly famous social media personality, to advocate for patients’ rights. During Cummings’ several minutes-long speech, Shkreli repeatedly looked away, smiled, and briefly appeared to be posing for pictures. “I see you’re smiling, but I’m very serious, sir,” Cummings said. “The way I see it, you can go down in history as the poster boy for greedy drug company executives, or you could change the system. … Yeah, _you_.” Thursday’s hearing was focused on Turing and Valeant Pharmaceuticals, both of which have rapidly driven up the price of drugs in their portfolios that they did not invent. Turing and Valeant have both turned over tens of thousands of pages of documents to Congressional investigators. The reams of internal emails, memos and conversations indicate that both companies prioritized the maximization of profits over patient access to their drugs, and call into question the company’s promises that it intended to roll the new revenue into research. The findings echoed those of a previous Senate investigation, which found that the global pharmaceutical company Gilead, in increasing the price of a hepatitis C drug to $84,000, had done so solely to maximize profits despite awareness that patients could not longer afford the life-saving drug. Shkreli, who was dressed in a slick black jacket, has become the poster boy of the pharmaceutical industry in recent months. He was arrested last year over fraud allegations concerning a hedge fund he managed from 2009 to 2014, and in December, he resigned from Turing, but remains the company’s majority shareholder. His fame comes in part from Turing’s decision last year to buy the rights to the drug Daraprim, which treats a serious parasitic disease, and then immediately raise the price per pill from $13 a pill to $750. At the hearing Thursday, Nancy Retzlaff, the chief commercial officer at Turing, defended the company’s decision on the grounds that the revenue from that price hike would be rolled back into research and development for new life-saving drugs. Retzclaff also said that two-thirds of patients who use Daraprim end up paying one penny per pill, due to a steep discount offered through Medicare and Medicaid, and that the company funds an assistance program for uninsured, low-income patients. Despite lawmakers’ efforts to determine who bears the brunt of the full $750 per-pill cost, the hearing ended largely in confusion. Insurance companies, hospitals, and patients who do not qualify for low-income assistance can be asked to pay up to $30,000 for a bottle of the pills. By about hour-three of the hearing, Republican lawmakers began focusing in on “burdensome regulations” at the Food and Drug Administration which slow the approval of new generic drugs. Janet Woodcock, the director for the center of drug evaluation and research at the FDA, Howard Schiller of Valeant Pharmaceuticals, and Mark Merritt of the Pharmaceutical Care Management Association also testified at the hearing. Shkreli was forced to attend Thursday’s hearing under subpoena that he repeatedly threatened to ignore. His attorney, Benjamin Brafman, later dismissed Shkreli’s behavior—the smirking, the fidgeting—as “nervous energy” and not intended to show disrespect for Congress. ## Transcript [00:01] On the advice of counsel I invoke the fifth amendment. [00:03] Privilege against self- incrimination and respectfully [00:06] decline to answer your question. I just want to make [00:08] sure you understand, you are welcome to answer [00:11] questions and not all of your answers are gonna [00:13] subject you to incrimination. You understand that, [00:15] don't you? I intend [00:20] to follow the advice of my counsel, not yours. Like a [00:22] Ponzi scheme, it appears that Deterring may be using [00:27] revenues from Diafram to research and identify [00:31] the next drug that it will acquire and then impose [00:34] similarly massive price increases on future [00:38] victims. It's not funny Mrs. Zurreli, people [00:42] are dying, and they are getting sicker and sicker. The [00:45] way I see it you can go down in history as the poster [00:49] boy For greedy drug company executives, or [00:54] you can change the system. Yeah, you. You've [00:58] detailed the knowledge about drug companies and the [01:02] system we have today. And I truly believe, I [01:07] truly believe. Are you listening? Say [01:12] yes. Yes. Thank you. I truly [01:16] believe you could become a force of tremendous good. [01:20] It's your intention to decline all answers to the [01:23] questions and invoke your fifth amendment, right? Yes. [01:27] Given that the witness has indicated that he Does not [01:29] intend to answer any questions and out of respect for [01:32] his constitutional rights, I ask now that the Committee [01:35] excuse the witness from the table. Without objection, [01:38] so ordered. 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