Investors: Shkreli was shady

NEW YORK — The jury at the securities fraud trial of “Pharma Bro” Martin Shkreli has heard investors accuse the quirky former biotech CEO of repeatedly giving them the runaround when they tried to pull their money out of his failing health care hedge fund.

But the government witnesses have made a concession the defense hopes plays in its favor: In the end, they made a killing.

Whether jurors at the trial that began June 26 in federal court in Brooklyn will see Shkreli’s clients as victims of a crime is central to the case.

Testimony resumed Thursday, with the government in the middle of its case.

The lack of clear-cut financial harm separates the alleged fraud from others like Bernard Madoff’s notorious Ponzi scheme, which wiped out the nest eggs of ordinary investors. Prosecutors have argued it doesn’t matter because Shkreli still broke the law by blowing investors’ funds with bad stock picks and lying to them.

An unrepentant Shkreli has denied wrongdoing, telling reporters last month that prosecutors “blame me for everything. They blame me for capitalism.” The comments prompted the judge to order him to shut up about the case in and around the courthouse.

On cross-examination, the investor witnesses said Shkreli made settlement deals that ultimately proved profitable. Blanton got $2.6 million — $200,000 in cash and the balance from shares of Retrophin he sold, and in addition still holds shares worth $3 million; Kocher made an estimated $350,000 the same way; a third witness, Schuyler Marshall, doubled his initial $200,000 investment.