Several Martin Shkreli Jurors Reportedly Feel ‘Ill’ Over Their Verdict: ‘Everyone Wanted To Go Home’


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Although “Pharma Bro” Martin Shkreli was convicted of several counts in his federal securities fraud trial (and sent to jail for threatening Hillary Clinton), he escaped convictions for many of the more severe charges levied against him. And according to a new report by The Daily Beast, many of the jurors who ultimately prevented Shkreli from receiving a much harsher string of convictions and punishments aren’t too happy with their work. In fact, one juror said being on that jury made him or her feel “ill,” especially since they all just “wanted to go home.”

Of the eight counts against him, Shkreli was only convicted of three, but two jurors who spoke anonymously with The Daily Beast insist that number would have been five if it weren’t for some confusing legal language, a holdout juror and everyone’s exhaustion:

“We didn’t know until the trial was over that counts five and seven were the top counts, carrying the possibility of the most prison time,” said Juror A.

“It made me ill to be persuaded to vote not guilty on those counts,” says Juror B.

“More than persuaded, I felt bullied into the not-guilty vote” on those counts, says Juror A. “After we voted pretty quickly and unanimously to convict Shkreli on Counts Three, Two, and Six, we came to Count Five. Our first vote on this count was 11-1 to convict.”

The two counts the jury didn’t convict Shkreli were serious wire fraud charges that, had they decided otherwise, would have threatened the defendant with a 20-year jail sentence. Yet these jurors claim a holdout who “would not budge” ultimately prevented this from happening, as they were “adamant that the way the judge’s instructions were written, there was no way to convict.” To make matters worse, they felt discouraged from asking Judge Kiyo Matsumoto for clarification, as she had previously (and publicly) “refused to clarify anything” for them on another matter.


Also, they were tired:

“I was exhausted,” says Juror A.

“Me too,” says Juror B.

“Everyone knew that the holdout juror was never going to budge and had started to convince everyone to switch to a not guilty vote,” says Juror A.

“Someone mentioned the movie ’12 Angry Men,'” says Juror B.

“We’d been at this for almost six weeks,” says Juror A. “We were all anxious and tired.”

“Everybody wanted to go home,” Juror B says. “That ‘Friday jury syndrome’ is a reality. So by 2:30 p.m. we all voted not guilty.”

New of Shkreli’s bond being revoked due to his prior threats against Hillary Clinton hit during the interview, leading the anonymous jurors to dub it “karma.” Yet despite Pharma Bro’s jail time (and the possible fact that his infamous Wu-Tang Clan album isn’t real), it seems these two — and other members of the jury, save for a holdout — feel they didn’t punish Shkreli enough when they had the chance.

(Via The Daily Beast)

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