“Pharma Bro” Martin Shkreli is reportedly serving his prison sentence in solitary confinement after running his drug company through a contraband cellphone.
Shkreli is about one year and seven months into a seven-year sentence after being convicted on two counts of securities fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud. While locked up in the Federal Correctional Institution in New Jersey, Shkreli has stayed involved with his company Phoenixus AG by phone, even firing the company’s interim CEO from his cell, reported Forbes.
The Wall Street Journal reported on Shkreli’s contraband phone, which violated prison rules, March 7. Sometime during March, prison authorities placedShkreli in solitary confinement because of his continued involvement with Phoenixus AG, formerly known as Turing Pharmaceuticals AG, two sources told Forbes.
A fellow inmate of Shkreli’s, Justin Liverman, told Forbes the disgraced former pharmaceutical CEO was still in solitary Sunday.
Shkreli also used his illegal cellphone to post to Twitter through another account after his original was suspended for violating the social media platform’s rules on abusive behavior, TheWSJ reported.
GOP Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas introduced a bill Monday to allow prisons to jam cell phone signals, citing Shkreli’s behavior as an example of why the law is needed.
“‘Pharma Bro’ Martin Shkreli is in jail for fraud, yet was able to continue his scam thanks to a contraband cellphone. My bill would allow prisons to jam cellphones so inmates can’t continue their crime sprees from behind bars,” Cotton wrote on Twitter.
In other cases, contraband cell phones have been used by criminals to order assassinations on police officers and prison guards. The use of such contraband is pervasive throughout the prison system as inmates work with allies on the outside to bypass prison security and connect with the outside world.
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