0:00

Hey,

0:00

Prime members. You can listen to Scamfluencers

0:02

ad free on Amazon music. Download

0:05

the app today.

0:12

Agie. Hey,

0:14

baby. Okay.

0:15

So who do you think is someone

0:17

that everyone everywhere no matter

0:19

what their political affiliation or moral

0:21

alignment can agree sucks?

0:24

I don't know. This is a

0:26

very random answer, but

0:28

I feel like everyone hates Amarosa.

0:31

She was on the apprentice. like a very

0:33

early season of Donald Trump's old

0:35

show. I didn't come here to make friends.

0:37

I said that from day one. And if you all stop

0:39

being so freaking sensitive, you know

0:43

too short to be a bitch. She

0:46

was so ruthless then she

0:48

kind of joined him when he started

0:50

his political career then everyone hated

0:52

her even more. Yeah. And then she bailed

0:54

on him too. Yeah. And he hates

0:56

her and yeah. Alright. That's a that's

0:58

a pretty good answer. I will say I was

1:00

half expecting you to say me

1:03

or even us based on our Apple

1:05

Podcast reviews, some of which are Theres

1:07

rude. Yeah. I mean,

1:10

I do think a lot of people can unite

1:12

over disliking us. Don't forget to

1:14

leave us a review. Okay. Well,

1:16

anyway, I wanna talk to you about

1:18

one super rich cartoonishly evil

1:21

entrepreneur who is so notoriously

1:24

and unilaterally

1:24

loathed.

1:25

that I'm pretty sure he's actually the great

1:28

equalizer across the globe.

1:30

Yeah. That is a very powerful

1:32

full position to be in when everyone

1:35

hates you. Everyone loves a supervillain until

1:38

they don't.

1:42

It's a clear and unusually warm warning

1:44

in New York City on December seventeenth twenty

1:46

fifteen. It's early,

1:48

like six thirty AM. And Martin

1:51

Screlli is likely fast asleep in his

1:53

Murray Hill apartment. For non New

1:55

Yorkers, Murray Hill is a Manhattan neighborhood

1:57

full of finance bros and PR girls.

1:59

I personally cannot afford to

2:02

live there, not on some podcast or salary.

2:04

Mhmm. Martin is thirty two years

2:06

old with sharp facial features and dark

2:09

swoopy hair. And I imagine

2:11

that he's jolted awake when

2:13

he hears a loud banging at the front door.

2:16

He's groggy and disoriented. He

2:18

throws on a gray hoodie and opens

2:21

the door to a group of FBI

2:23

agents with handcuffs. Martin

2:25

is under arrest and he's charged

2:27

with securities fraud. The

2:29

feds say he misled investors, lied

2:32

to brokers, and misappropriated hundreds

2:34

of thousands of dollars from head funds.

2:36

Martin

2:37

is thrown into the back of a squad

2:39

car and taken to the Jacob k Javits

2:41

federal

2:41

building in Lower Manhattan.

2:44

The building is a forty one story glass

2:46

and concrete monolith. And instead

2:48

of sneaking him through the back, the FBI

2:50

decides to

2:51

march Martin through a crowd over orders

2:53

and photographers who are waiting upfront. It's

2:56

a complete media frenzy. I

2:59

actually have a picture of it. Sarah, can you

3:01

describe it? Oh, yeah. I

3:03

can describe it without even looking at it. I

3:05

know this photo very well. It's

3:07

Martin Scrrelli. He Koul

3:09

know, is totally stone faced. Yeah. She's

3:11

wearing the gray hoodie we all know

3:14

and Amanda love. I mean,

3:16

it's a very evocative photo because

3:18

he looks so normal. Like, he wouldn't look

3:20

at this guy and think, he's

3:22

done all these things. No. Total

3:24

normie. I feel like he looks like a

3:26

poorly behaved teen being trotted out for

3:28

like a doctor Phil segment where he gets sent

3:30

to the ranch. You know? Yeah. Well,

3:33

facing the cameras and the flashing lights,

3:35

Martin's facial expression

3:36

is completely blank.

3:38

A lifetime of putting up walls and hiding

3:40

his emotions has prepared

3:41

him very well for this moment.

3:43

But now he's finally facing consequences,

3:46

and he could serve up to twenty years

3:48

in prison. Martin

3:50

Screlli is a rags to Ricky, and then

3:52

back to rags story. Adopting

3:54

American capitalism is his religion, each

3:57

rated

3:58

for money. And in the end,

3:59

he became public enemy number

4:02

one.

4:05

From

4:08

wondering, I'm Sasha Koul, and I'm

4:10

Sarah Hagi, and this is Scamfluencers.

4:20

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4:22

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4:24

It's a little bit about financial fraud,

4:27

a little bit about how love can

4:29

truly blind us, and it hit on

4:31

a little hobby horse of Amanda

4:33

about how incredibly fucked up the American

4:35

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4:35

system is. Theres something for

4:37

us all.

4:38

This is

4:39

Theres something about Martin part

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6:17

Before

6:17

he becomes a symbol for American

6:19

capitalism, Martin Scrrelli is

6:21

just a shy, awkward kid struggling

6:23

to fit in. He grows up in a

6:25

very working class family sheeps head

6:27

Bay, Brooklyn, near Coney Island.

6:30

He's one of four kids in a close knit

6:32

albanian Croatian family. The

6:34

neighborhood is dense with eastern European

6:36

immigrants like his parents. They

6:38

both work odd jobs mostly as janitors.

6:41

For a while, his dad works as a

6:43

doorman. Martin later says that

6:45

he grows up with a lot of financial

6:47

and medical anxieties that his

6:49

family has a history of mental health issues.

6:51

He's skeletal Amanda he skipped

6:53

the first grade, so he's younger than his

6:55

classmates. He often shows up to

6:57

school without enough money for lunch, never

7:00

mind cool sneakers and nice clothes.

7:02

He seems like a

7:04

lonely outcast, desperate to be

7:06

liked. and it doesn't help that his

7:08

hobbies are pretty He's

7:11

into chess, video games, and computer

7:13

programming. Martin

7:15

has zero social status.

7:17

So he seems to fixate on how to gain

7:20

power by getting rich as hell.

7:22

When he's just thirteen years old, he reportedly

7:25

asks his parents for the book Alchemy of

7:27

Finance for Christmas. Around

7:29

this time, his father says he

7:31

gives him two thousand dollars to play the stock

7:33

market in his name. Here's what he

7:35

later tells a vice reporter. I got

7:37

interested in stock as a kid. And my friends made

7:39

fun of me all the time for

7:41

that. And I I told

7:43

them that it would someday would matter.

7:46

Okay. Well, by someday, it would matter

7:48

Koul mean for your entire existence forever.

7:51

Since forever, like, for hundreds of

7:53

Theres. But also, I do think

7:55

that there's something about guys like this.

7:57

They always have a story where they're

7:59

like, when I was a kid, no one liked

8:01

me, but I was studying the blade. know what

8:03

I mean? feel like a lot of the stories we do around

8:05

men are just like joke or origin stories

8:07

because they all kind of feel the same

8:09

way. It's like somebody didn't like it. I

8:11

went back special since I was a kid because

8:13

people didn't like me and I had some -- Yeah. --

8:15

truly lame interest. And that's

8:17

why I'm a genius. Well,

8:21

Martin reads newspapers, absorbing

8:24

everything he can about trading and

8:26

Wall Street. And by the time he's in

8:28

high school in the mid nineties, he's

8:30

already pretty good at playing the stock market.

8:32

One day, he's hanging at his crush's

8:34

house in her bedroom. When her

8:36

dad knocked on the door and asks to speak

8:38

with Martin in the other room. So

8:40

Martin is preparing himself for the whole. If

8:42

you touch my daughter, I'll kill you talk,

8:45

but the dad looks at him with

8:47

a serious expression on his face,

8:49

and he asks Martin

8:51

for investment advice. Oh,

8:54

god. What a loser dad?

8:57

That would that would be a boner

8:59

killer for me, I think. Also,

9:02

thought no one liked Koul, Martin. Suddenly you're in a girl's

9:04

room. Yeah. I didn't go into a boys room

9:06

until my twenty eight. Well,

9:09

Martin is consumed by

9:11

this obsession with getting rich to prove

9:13

himself. And it seems like he

9:15

thinks he's always the smartest person in

9:17

the room, even in a room full

9:19

of adults. So he

9:21

starts questioning authority, especially

9:23

the kind of authority that stands between him

9:26

and serious money. When

9:28

he finally gets unleashed on Wall Street a few

9:30

years later, the rules won't

9:32

apply.

9:35

As a seventeen year old freshman at Baru

9:37

College, Martin scores an internship

9:39

at a Wall Street hedge fund. It's

9:41

called Kramer Berkowitz. And Jim

9:43

Kramer, a host of CNBC's mad money

9:45

with Jim Kramer is a partner

9:47

there. I picture Martin standing

9:49

outside their offices wearing a starched

9:51

button down shirt and Ricky backs.

9:54

His eyes are all big as he

9:56

stares up at a skyscraper. It's

9:58

probably a huge deal for a working class

10:00

kid like him. It's the

10:02

first day of the rest of his life.

10:04

At first, Martin's job

10:06

is mostly menial tasks. File

10:09

this, staple that, But Martin's dreams

10:11

are too big for the admin work he's been

10:13

given. So he learns

10:15

all he can about the stock and

10:17

he spends hours in chat rooms after

10:20

work, speculating about stocks.

10:22

And it turns out, Sarah, he's

10:24

pretty good at it. One

10:26

day, he suggested his employer short

10:28

a biotech stock. Basically,

10:30

that means taking a huge bet that the price

10:32

of the stock would plummet. So

10:35

Kramer Berkwitz takes a chance on Martin's

10:37

hunch and it pays off

10:39

big time. The share price of the

10:41

stock takes a nose dive and the firm

10:43

makes a huge profit. I mean,

10:45

it is very remarkable that Martin

10:47

is so young and

10:50

able to do this? Yeah. It's such

10:52

a good play in fact that the

10:54

Securities and Exchange Commission calls

10:56

Kramer Berkowitz to make sure that they didn't

10:58

have any insider knowledge.

10:59

but they don't find anything.

11:02

Just a gangly teenager with good

11:04

instincts. Martin knows

11:06

that a lot of biotech firms are out

11:08

there raising tons of money,

11:10

promising investors that their drug is gonna cure

11:12

diseases also

11:14

make them very rich. But most

11:16

don't even get their drugs approved by the

11:18

FDA. And without approval, the

11:20

value of their shares plummet. It's

11:22

a lot of bluffing and Martin knows how to

11:25

sniff it out. So he becomes a

11:27

golden boy at the firm. According

11:29

to Vanity Fair, he becomes Cramer

11:31

Berkowitz's mole, spying on

11:33

hedge funds and then sharing the information with

11:35

the team. After

11:37

graduating from Barooq College, a just

11:39

twenty years old, Martin is hired by Kramer

11:42

Berkowitz as an analyst, but

11:44

he

11:44

doesn't stay put for long.

11:45

He takes

11:46

jobs at a few other firms over the next

11:48

few years. using his reputation for

11:50

being a finance prodigy to climb

11:52

the ladder on Wall Street. When he

11:54

decides to start his own firm,

11:56

Eylea capital management in two thousand

11:58

and six, He easily convinces

12:00

multiple investors to raise

12:02

roughly five million dollars to

12:04

help him get it off the ground. But

12:06

Martin's boldness is a double

12:07

edged sword. He

12:08

loves making big bets, but

12:11

sometimes he's wrong. And

12:13

being wrong on Wall Street is

12:15

very expensive.

12:17

A year after

12:19

founding Eylea capital management,

12:21

Martin makes a big gamble. He

12:24

bets more than two million dollars that the market

12:26

will drop. And when it

12:28

doesn't, he doesn't have the money to pay

12:30

back the investment bank Lehman Brothers.

12:33

So Lehman Brothers takes Martin to

12:35

court and wins a two point three million

12:37

dollar

12:37

judgment against him. But

12:39

Martin has impeccable timing as

12:42

ever because something big happens on

12:44

Wall Street in two thousand and eight.

12:46

Sarah, do you have any guesses? You

12:49

know, I watched a bit of

12:51

this movie once while on my phone called

12:53

The Big Short. Does it have

12:55

anything to do with that? I

12:57

think so. I also watched that movie. I

12:59

barely understand this. So I

13:01

was like, money bad. Money bad,

13:03

me stupid. That's what I took from that

13:05

movie. But yes, you're right. In

13:07

two thousand and eight, the stock market

13:09

collapsed says, and the world is thrown

13:11

into a financial crisis. It's

13:14

the millennial original sin,

13:16

basically. And also so,

13:18

Lehman Brothers completely folds.

13:20

They file for bankruptcy and

13:22

guess who doesn't have to pay them back anymore?

13:24

Our boy Martin our boy,

13:27

Martin. Martin might be off the

13:29

hook, but his new company has

13:31

been destroyed. So he moves

13:33

back home to sheeps at bay. It's

13:35

probably a little depressing to go from being

13:37

a swanky Wall Street player to sleeping in

13:39

your childhood bedroom, but Martin

13:42

refuses to stay down. And

13:44

this time, he's determined to do

13:46

whatever it takes to succeed,

13:48

legal, or otherwise. After

13:52

a while, Martin remembers the thing that made him

13:54

a superstar when he was still just

13:56

an intern, shorting biotech

13:59

stocks. So he decides to start a

14:01

new hedge fund that focuses on doing

14:02

just that. He calls

14:04

it MSMB Capital,

14:06

and tactics are

14:08

savage. He goes online and

14:10

spreads rumors that certain stocks will go

14:12

down, influencing people to sell

14:14

them.

14:15

And it works. Technically,

14:17

this kind of market manipulation is

14:20

illegal, but it's really hard to prove.

14:22

So it seems like there

14:24

are a lot of things are illegal

14:27

wink

14:27

wink. You know? Yes. Or it's like,

14:30

I don't know. Is it legal

14:32

wink? Yeah. There's a lot of

14:34

sort of internal winking happening

14:37

in this industry that you and I will never

14:39

understand. But Martin

14:41

is back baby. He's out

14:43

of his Sarah' house with a new company.

14:45

From the

14:45

outside, things seem to be going great.

14:48

Martin

14:48

calls and emails current investors

14:50

and prospective investors to tell them that

14:52

MSMB is killing

14:54

it. But he's hiding a big secret

14:56

from them. He

14:57

owes millions to

14:59

the

14:59

investors for his first failed company,

15:01

and he doesn't have it. The

15:04

truth is MSMB is barely

15:06

surviving. How do you function

15:08

knowing you owe millions of dollars? I don't

15:10

know. I get nervous when I get a Venmo

15:12

request that I don't immediately fulfill.

15:15

But Martin still manages to

15:17

court investors. One of them

15:19

is twenty one year old Sarah Hassan.

15:21

She's got long brown hair and

15:23

dimples, Her dad is an uber wealthy

15:25

pharmaceuticals executive, and

15:27

she appears to be following in his

15:29

footsteps. She just graduated with an

15:31

MBA in finance and pharmaceutical

15:33

management. And after she hears that Martin

15:35

is a rising star in the hedge fund

15:37

world, she decides she needs

15:39

to meet him.

15:41

Martin and Sarah meet at a restaurant

15:44

in Manhattan in January twenty

15:46

eleven. And Martin reportedly tells

15:48

Sarah that MSMB is

15:50

managing between forty and

15:52

fifty million dollars, which

15:54

is a lie. Really, they

15:56

have less than seven hundred bucks, which

15:58

is mostly a result of Martin's reckless

16:00

trading. How the

16:02

hell is this guy walking around?

16:04

Saying he's managing between

16:06

forty to fifty million

16:09

dollars when you have less than seven

16:11

hundred bucks. That's not even rent

16:13

for a room these days. It's nothing.

16:15

It's not even rent for one of four

16:17

bedrooms you would have to share in like

16:19

Koul green. I am

16:21

shaken by this lie. I

16:23

know. Martin, hang on.

16:25

Martin.

16:27

Well, despite all of

16:30

this lying, the dinner

16:32

goes well. and Sarah decides

16:34

to invest three hundred thousand dollars

16:36

into MSMB Capital. Martin

16:38

starts sending Sarah email updates boasting

16:40

about the company's success. But within

16:42

a month, the emails have stopped.

16:45

Martin doesn't have much good news to report

16:47

anyway. It turns out he shorted

16:49

another pharma stock and reportedly

16:51

lost some seven million dollars.

16:53

That is insane.

16:55

He had seven hundred dollars.

16:57

Yeah. Now he's losing seven Martin. The

16:59

story does make me to feel the money

17:01

is not real. What's real? What is

17:03

real on this earth? It's making me feel crazy.

17:06

Yeah. I don't know. But in the

17:08

fall of twenty twelve, Sarah gets an email from

17:10

Martin telling her that he's closing his

17:12

firm. All the money is

17:14

gone. And I can only

17:16

imagine that Sarah is

17:18

pissed the loss makes her look

17:20

really bad. But Martin tells

17:22

her not to worry. He's starting a

17:24

new pharma company called

17:26

Retrophin. focused on creating medicine for

17:28

rare diseases, and she can take

17:30

her payout in either cash or shares

17:32

of the company. Sarah chooses

17:35

cash, obviously, but receives shares of

17:37

a shell company instead. After

17:39

a six month legal dispute, Martin

17:41

finally agrees to wire her

17:43

three hundred thousand dollars, the money she

17:46

initially invested in the

17:48

company, plus she gets to keep the

17:50

stocks. By this point, Retrophin

17:52

has taken off and Martin's recently

17:54

been featured in a Forbes thirty under thirty

17:56

finance list. It's a glowing

17:58

profile with the headline.

17:59

fund, gadfly, trans biotech

18:02

entrepreneur. It pains him

18:03

as a wonderkid who's dedicated to

18:05

funding new medicines to help people with

18:08

rare Sarah, take a

18:10

look. Yeah. I mean, this is

18:12

a real Forbes article. It's not

18:14

like one of those paid partnership

18:16

things that you see at the top. Yeah.

18:18

No. it's real. And,

18:20

you know, just skimming through it, it's really

18:22

framing this as a guy

18:25

who wants to just do right by the

18:27

world. There's a quote saying, I'd like

18:29

to focus on my life on

18:31

creating new medicines for people who are

18:33

suffering from rare diseases. And

18:35

I guess if you just read something like

18:37

that, you think like Oh, yeah. This guy's using finance

18:39

for good. Yeah.

18:41

Well, at this point, Martin must

18:43

feel amazing with all of his attention.

18:47

Retrophin has raised millions Amanda his

18:49

investors are heavy hitters, like the CEO

18:51

of the maker of BOTOX. And

18:53

before long, Martin will make a name

18:55

for himself even out side

18:56

of Wall Street and Big Pharma as the most

18:58

hated man in America.

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20:29

Now,

20:32

I feel like

20:35

In twenty

20:37

fourteen, three years after Martin starts

20:40

Retrophin, he buys the rights to a drug

20:42

called Koul. which helps prevent a

20:44

rare form of kidney stone, and

20:46

he immediately jacks the price up

20:48

exponentially from a dollar fifty

20:50

a pill to thirty dollars

20:52

a pill. Oh my

20:54

god. Yeah. This is when we get into supervillain

20:56

territory. There aren't a

20:58

ton of people who need the ola, but

21:00

those who do have to take several

21:02

pills a day. So the price

21:04

increase results in big profits for

21:06

Martin and big losses for

21:08

everyone

21:08

who actually needs this drug.

21:10

for Trophy

21:11

Stock skyrockets. And then

21:13

on May twenty nine to twenty

21:15

fourteen, Theres tweets two things.

21:18

Sarah, could you read this tweet

21:20

first? Sarah, everyone

21:22

having a nice day. Isn't

21:24

there just something bone

21:27

chilling? about someone who writes tweets like

21:29

like it's just so pleasant, but isn't it spooky?

21:31

And then just two

21:33

minutes later, Martin fires off another tweet.

21:36

And this one says, quote, this is one of

21:39

the best days of my life. Sarah,

21:41

can you guess why Martin might be tweeting

21:43

all of this? Does it have

21:46

anything to do with him making a

21:48

ton of money? Well,

21:50

Retrophin closes a deal that

21:52

same day. buying a new drug from a

21:54

private Texas based company.

21:56

And

21:56

Martin is using his Twitter account to

21:58

hint that Retrophin is

21:59

doing really well. basically amounts to

22:02

manipulating the stock market by trying to

22:04

encourage people to buy shares of his

22:06

company. Martin takes a

22:08

lot of heat for this. the

22:10

members of Retrophin's board are

22:12

furious. They tell him to stop

22:14

tweeting and to get his act together. Well,

22:16

yeah, I feel like he's doing a

22:18

big faux pas in this kind of world full

22:20

of old people who don't use the Internet, which

22:22

is -- Yes. -- shut up. Other people

22:24

can't know what we're really

22:25

like. Well,

22:28

the other thing is that you

22:29

can't tame Martin Scrrelli. The

22:32

day after he sends those tweets, he pulls

22:35

another stunt. Now

22:35

that the price of Retrophin is Sarah, he

22:38

sells nearly four point five million

22:40

dollars worth of his own shares of

22:42

it. Martin offloading all of those

22:44

shares makes him a ton of money, but it

22:46

also makes his investors think

22:48

something bad is going down at the

22:50

company, and everyone sells

22:52

tanking the stock.

22:53

So he really just

22:55

doesn't care at all if he burns his own

22:58

company down as long as he makes money.

23:00

Yeah. And at this point, Martin's

23:02

obsession shifts from making money

23:04

to keeping it. Even if it

23:06

means breaking rules, further

23:08

trashing his patient and

23:10

alienating everyone around him,

23:12

including the people of his own

23:14

company.

23:17

In September twenty fourteen,

23:19

the chairman of Retrophin's board calls

23:21

Martin for a meeting on the twenty second floor

23:23

of his office in Midtown East.

23:26

Looking out at the city from this phallic glass tower,

23:29

Martin must feel like the master of the

23:31

universe, but the chairman tries to bring

23:33

him back to earth. He

23:36

reportedly tells Martin that the board has had

23:38

it with him. They want him out

23:40

as CEO. He can stay

23:42

on as senior adviser, but he can't be the face of the

23:43

company anymore. About a year and

23:45

a half later, he reflects on this time

23:47

in an interview with a podcast called

23:50

Schmucks.

23:50

My board fired me

23:52

over Twitter. There's things that as a CEO,

23:54

you probably shouldn't do on Twitter, and that's

23:57

fine. But my addiction to social

23:59

media was so

24:01

strong I mean, that's

24:02

probably one of the more honest things he

24:05

said, I guess, because it's a

24:07

hundred percent true. Well, At

24:09

the time, Martin is too deep in his Twitter

24:11

addiction to even understand what a blow

24:13

this really is. And

24:16

dead, he basically laughs in the chairman of the board's

24:19

face. He refuses to accept the demotion

24:21

and he brags that he doesn't even need

24:23

Retrophin. It's

24:25

fact, that same weekend, he decides to start

24:27

a new company. Turing. What's

24:29

up with these guys invoking, like,

24:31

old scientist names for their companies?

24:33

Like, it doesn't make you seem like

24:36

you have more experience. know?

24:38

Yeah. I mean, they're just trying to recapture

24:40

lightning in a bottle. It's

24:43

aspirational. Yeah. It is. It it'd

24:45

be like if I'm like, I'm

24:47

starting a company called Rihanna.

24:49

Oh, god. That'd be fun.

24:52

Well, being kicked out of Retrophin seems

24:54

to strip Martin of any

24:56

accountability. Now, he feels

24:58

free to flaunt his money

25:00

and status. But his next big

25:02

attempt to impress people completely

25:05

backfires.

25:09

About six months later, on a cold spring night in

25:11

March twenty fifteen, Martin shows up

25:13

to the museum of modern art's PS

25:16

one location and Wiebe. There's

25:18

a huge stage with a

25:20

massive screen and towering speakers on

25:22

either side. The stage has just

25:24

three chairs. one for forty five year

25:26

old WU Tang clan rapper Riza,

25:28

his coproducer Producer, and

25:30

a music critic from The New Yorker.

25:32

They're here to host a private

25:34

listening party for a very unique album called

25:36

once upon a time in Shaolin, which

25:38

features all surviving members of the

25:40

Wootang clan. The album is

25:43

wild, It features a guest appearance

25:45

from share and comes in a hand carved

25:47

box with a hundred and seventy four pages

25:49

of liner notes. And it's

25:51

been stored in a vault in a hotel

25:53

in Morocco, watched over by security guards since

25:55

Riza and SilvaChain's finished it.

25:58

Oh, I know this album. It

26:00

is very infamous. Yeah.

26:03

And has been the

26:05

subject for a lot of controversy.

26:08

Yes.

26:08

Well, Ricky auctioning off

26:10

the

26:10

only existing copy of the

26:13

album slash art piece to the highest

26:15

bidder. Tonight, he's twelve

26:17

minutes of this precious music to a

26:19

tray exclusive crowd of roughly three

26:21

dozen fans, potential

26:23

buyers and members of the

26:25

press.

26:25

Soon after the listening party, Briza gets

26:28

a call. The auction house he's

26:30

working with has found a buyer. Here's

26:31

what he later recalls in an interview

26:34

with Bloomberg. They say Wiebe have another guy who

26:36

just came on board. He's interested. He's

26:38

young. He's he's a Koul Tang fan. He loves

26:40

hip hop. Would you like

26:42

the needle? and that's how Rizzo finds himself sitting

26:44

across from Martin Scrillo. They connect

26:46

on

26:46

their humble backgrounds and their love of hip hop.

26:48

And by the end of their meeting,

26:50

Rizzo feels comfortable in the

26:52

album to him. Martin doesn't tell anyone that

26:55

he's the secret buyer of Shaolin,

26:57

making him the only person on Earth

26:59

who can listen to the album. But

27:01

when his little secret eventually gets

27:03

out, it'll come at the worst

27:05

possible time, bringing

27:07

Martin to unimaginable

27:08

new lows.

27:12

Martin Scrlli

27:13

is feeling like a baller in

27:16

Turing's high rise office in Murray

27:18

Hill. After the roller coaster of

27:20

working on Wall Street dealing with

27:22

all the risks and losses, Martin shifts

27:24

his focus to more of a sure

27:27

thing. He notices big pharma

27:29

buying orphan drugs drugs

27:31

that treat diseases so rare that they

27:33

often have no competition and

27:35

jacking up the price. So

27:38

in August of twenty fifteen, Martin buys an orphan

27:40

drug called diaphragm, which is used

27:42

to treat toxoplasmosis. It's

27:44

an in fact that mostly affects

27:47

people with HIV and AIDS and

27:49

pregnant people, and the drug to

27:51

treat it can be lifesaving. At the

27:53

time that he buys it, There's no

27:55

generic form of it. So Martin

27:57

immediately raises the price of Darrow Prim

27:59

by more than five thousand percent.

28:02

And overnight, a single pill goes from

28:04

thirteen dollars and fifty cents

28:06

to seven hundred and fifty

28:08

dollars.

28:10

This was another big

28:13

moment where if you

28:15

hadn't heard about him by now, this is when you're

28:17

gonna hear about him. And I just remember

28:19

all the headlines of like -- Yeah.

28:21

-- this scumbag. Like, he took

28:23

this rare drug. Yeah.

28:25

It was so nakedly monstrous.

28:27

Everyone was like, Theres has to be something

28:29

else Theres. this can't just be what he

28:32

did. And I I just remember

28:34

everyone going so crazy.

28:36

Yeah. It's kind of a fun story

28:38

like, the person being terrible is that's it. There's no,

28:40

like, secret reason for any

28:42

of it. Within twenty four

28:44

hours, Martin goes from being just another

28:47

finance broke to being a

28:49

supervillain in the eyes of the public.

28:51

He actually earns a pretty

28:53

lasting nickname, the most hated

28:55

man in The thing

28:57

is Martin and Turing are not

28:59

the only

28:59

ones pulling this kind of stunt.

29:02

Drug makers raise the price of

29:04

lifesaving drugs all the time.

29:06

The difference is Martin doesn't shy away

29:08

from the spotlight. Here's what he

29:09

says about it on CBS this morning. Why was

29:12

it necessary to raise price of diaphragm so

29:14

drastically? Well, it depends on how you

29:16

define so drastically because the drug

29:18

was unprofitable at the former

29:20

price. And at this price, it's a

29:22

reasonable profit, not excessive at

29:24

all. I mean,

29:24

you have to sort of accept his terms

29:26

that healthcare is about a profit to even

29:28

wrap your head around the logic. Well, here's

29:30

a thing like, okay, he did something

29:33

terrible. There's no question. But

29:36

effectively, this is how health

29:39

works. Right? It is about

29:41

turning a profit in most

29:43

cases, especially in the US, and

29:45

there's a reason why people ration

29:48

insulin. Yeah. And it's not

29:50

because there's one villain

29:52

who's making insulin so

29:54

expensive that people die from

29:56

something they shouldn't be dying from. No.

29:58

There's several villains. It's because

30:00

that's how it works. Yeah. You

30:02

know, like, I guess in a way when I

30:04

think about it, like, this could have been this

30:06

moment of reckoning almost

30:08

of people being like, wait, someone can just

30:11

do this. These companies can just do this and they do it all the

30:13

time and it just happens to be an

30:15

extremely online troll who's doing it this time.

30:17

Yeah. But instead it I feel it

30:19

kind of became all about Martin Screlli

30:21

when it could have been about much more. You

30:23

know what I mean? Yeah. Well, in

30:25

the interview with CBS, also says

30:27

that the price hike won't actually

30:29

impact patients. He says the

30:31

additional cost

30:32

will only impact insurance companies

30:35

and hospitals. but that has created

30:37

its own set of problems that impacts

30:39

patients. The chief of infectious

30:41

diseases at Mount Sinai told Vanity

30:43

Fair that when her hospital tried to buy more

30:45

diaphragm, they were told that their credit

30:47

limit just wasn't high enough. And

30:49

an Emory University professor of Producer

30:51

NPR that one of her patients with

30:54

toxoplasmosis has been ready to leave the

30:56

hospital for months, but

30:58

no rehab facility will take

31:00

her because they can't afford the diaphragm

31:02

that she needs. All

31:04

the while, Martin is riling up his

31:06

haters even more by bragging about how

31:08

rich he is on Twitter. He tweets

31:10

out a photo of a bottle of nineteen

31:12

seventy nine wine and claims that it costs nine thousand

31:15

dollars. And more than once, he

31:17

tweets photos of the views from a

31:19

helicopter flying high over New

31:21

York City. Sarah, take a look.

31:23

This is so dupely

31:23

embarrassing for

31:24

Martin. There's no signifier of

31:27

not belonging more than

31:29

posting photos like this.

31:32

No person whose life is actually

31:34

like this would ever post this on Twitter

31:36

because it's tacky.

31:38

Yeah. He tweets like a middle aged

31:40

household. It's like visiting New York for the

31:42

first time. It's like Koul want a

31:44

contest. Well,

31:46

Martin quickly becomes the poster boy

31:48

for pharmaceutical greed. And it's not

31:50

like he's quietly breaking in

31:53

the dough. He's flaunting his wealth in the most

31:55

obnoxious way possible.

31:56

And the more he runs his mouth

31:58

on Twitter, the more his

31:59

enemies Marina take him down. including

32:02

some of the most powerful people

32:04

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Now

33:04

I feel like Martin

33:10

doesn't take his new spot as

33:12

America's most wanted capital is slightly.

33:15

On Twitter and Reddit, he calls the price hike a

33:17

great thing for society. He quotes

33:19

M and M and calls at least one reporter

33:22

a moron before briefly making

33:24

his Twitter private. Oh, and

33:26

all of this is happening during the lead up to a

33:28

presidential election. So

33:30

Martin becomes a talking point on the campaign trail.

33:32

That's price

33:33

gouging, pure and simple. It

33:36

looks like

33:36

a spoiled brat to me.

33:38

In an email to supporter, Sanders called Scrrelli,

33:40

a prescription drug price gouger.

33:42

Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton,

33:44

and Donald Trump all agreed.

33:47

Martin Screlli sucks.

33:50

It is cool that everyone can

33:52

get along to call him a

33:54

little bitch, you know. That's really

33:56

encouraging. But then something

33:58

else happens like keeps Martin

33:59

at the center of the Internet

34:01

storm. Bloomberg business revealed on Wednesday

34:03

that the buyer was pharmaceutical

34:05

Koul, Martin. glanny nothing to

34:08

with. And, you know, here

34:10

comes Martin Grelian, what does he

34:12

do? He did the Butang

34:14

clan.

34:14

Neither Butang nor Martin have ever

34:16

revealed how much he paid for the record.

34:18

But a friend of Martin's tells Bloomberg it was two million dollars.

34:21

In a statement to that

34:23

publication, Riza says, The

34:25

sale of once upon a time in Shaolin was agreed

34:28

upon in May, well before

34:30

Martin Martin business practices came

34:32

to light. we decided

34:33

to give a significant portion of

34:35

the proceeds to charity. About

34:37

a month later, Chris's

34:39

bandmate, ghostface killer, takes

34:41

things a step further. When asked by

34:43

TMZ how he felt about the guy who

34:45

bought once upon a time in Shaolin,

34:48

Ghost Face says.

34:49

Yeah. That's egg.

34:51

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

34:53

Yeah. You know what I mean? You don't

34:55

you don't take some eggs, a eggs

34:57

pill that you have I guess, was seven

34:59

dollars. It did make it, like, eight hundred dollars. Yeah. That's what you're saying. Koul don't do

35:01

that like that. Ghost calls on Martin to release

35:03

the album to

35:06

the

35:06

public. And in makes video.

35:08

The video, Sarah, it

35:10

is truly wild.

35:12

wilde There's

35:14

three randos wearing skeleton outfits and hoods standing around

35:16

him like they're his posse. He

35:19

sips his wine and calls Ghost

35:21

Face Killah an old Amanda

35:24

asks for a formal written apology, and

35:27

then he,

35:27

like, kinda threatens them. What is

35:29

that? Why are your goons not

35:31

as hard as mind. Go

35:34

stop pretending, stop acting, stop

35:36

lying. Be real as your video

35:38

once said. And

35:40

don't ever mention my name

35:42

again. Or it'll be

35:44

there'll be more more of a price to pay

35:46

than just this video. Just

35:48

what do you think Martin can't do

35:50

something more humiliating. He's so embarrassed. He

35:52

takes it to another level. This

35:56

video, he's also wearing, like, slightly

35:58

unbuttoned dress shirt with,

36:00

you know, a blazer on top. And it's,

36:02

like, what cartoon did you

36:04

watch where you thought this was cool?

36:06

Yeah. Some people are just born

36:08

embarrassing, Sarah. Like, you

36:10

could just Just stop. Well, obviously, Ghost Face can't just

36:12

sit back and take it. So, of

36:14

course, he makes a video

36:16

in response. yo, hilarious,

36:18

man. I don't know. You must be on

36:20

counseling this up, man. You know what I mean? Take

36:22

this up, man. It's like, yo, you will figure a

36:24

super Amanda then, Ghost

36:27

brings out his goons, meaning

36:29

his sister

36:30

and his mom. Look, Martin, if he

36:32

was my said, I would be your ass. I give you a ass whooping

36:34

because what Koul is so,

36:36

so He

36:37

tried to displace

36:40

my brother go space

36:42

killer.

36:42

There's nothing that scares me

36:44

more than being yelled at by somebody

36:46

else's mom or sister. Truly.

36:49

Yeah. Also, it's kind of like

36:51

be better ghost. Like, I

36:53

don't know. I kinda like it. don't

36:55

need to involve yourself in this

36:57

any further. Like, He's not a

37:00

worthy opponent. Yeah, I guess so, but

37:02

I'm glad he did it for the content.

37:04

Well, Martin's galactic level

37:05

of cringe definitely gets

37:08

some attention. But unfortunately for him, his Internet haters are

37:10

not the only one scrutinizing

37:12

everything he says and

37:14

does. The

37:16

FBI is

37:17

onto his case too, and they are

37:19

about to pounce. A

37:21

few months later,

37:22

in

37:23

December twenty fifteen, A

37:25

reporter named Christie Smythe gets a

37:28

scoop. Pharma's bad boy has been

37:30

arrested by the FBI in his Murray

37:32

Hill apartment.

37:34

She's

37:34

been tracking Martin

37:35

for a year, and she's been waiting for this moment. And

37:37

her patience pays off. She breaks

37:39

the story for Bloomberg. The

37:41

headline of

37:42

Christy's article is

37:43

matter of fact. Screlli, Sarah

37:46

gouger, denies

37:47

fraud and posts bail. Christy's

37:49

in

37:49

her early thirties with pale skin and

37:52

honey blonde hair. She covers the

37:54

federal court in Brooklyn and nearly

37:56

every day she writes about

37:58

different people companies suing each other. Her career is going

37:59

well, but she's

38:00

waiting for that big breakout Wiebe.

38:03

And

38:03

she probably thinks that

38:05

Martin Screlli might just be

38:07

the story she's waiting for.

38:10

Okay,

38:10

Satish, you know what? I'm gonna have to say

38:12

even if our listeners don't know where this

38:14

is going, I know where this is going.

38:17

I'm gonna tell you I like I don't like it one

38:19

bit. I know. Well, a handful of

38:21

months after Christie's article comes

38:23

out, she heads congress to

38:25

watch Martin testify about skyrocketing

38:28

drug prices. He wears a black blazer

38:30

and a stripe button down, and he's

38:32

got a

38:33

perma plastered on his face.

38:36

Martin is not here to make

38:38

friends. On the

38:38

stand, Christie takes

38:40

notes as Martin refuses to answer

38:42

a single question, invoking the fifth amendment every

38:44

time. A frustrated congressman Trey

38:46

Gowdy tries to get Martin to spill

38:48

the tea. You are welcome to

38:52

answer questions and not all of your answers are gonna subject you to

38:54

incrimination. Do you understand that? Don't you? I

38:56

intend to follow the advice of my counsel.

39:00

Not yours. Congressman Elijah

39:02

Cummings, ranking member of the sub committee,

39:04

tries to get through to Martin.

39:06

And, well, he's not exactly successful.

39:09

I wanna ask you to no.

39:11

I wanna plead with you. To

39:13

use any remaining influence you

39:15

have over your former

39:17

company, to press them to lower the price of

39:19

these drugs. You can look away if

39:21

you like, but I wish you could

39:23

see the faces people who cannot get the

39:25

drugs that they need. After the

39:28

hearing, Martin tweets out

39:29

hard to accept that these

39:30

imbeciles represent the people in

39:34

our government. Well, most people will conclude that, yeah,

39:36

Martin sucks. It does seem like

39:38

Christie sees something

39:40

else. A nerdy

39:42

man covering his insecurity with Romato.

39:44

Yeah. Get in line. That's

39:46

all men. Like, oh no.

39:49

He's so special. That's he's

39:51

a nerd who's insecure. Oh my god. Stop the

39:53

presses. Yeah. Well, Christie decides to

39:55

email Martin to get his

39:57

side of this story,

40:00

but he's hard to nail

40:02

down. She wonders, who is the

40:04

person behind the

40:06

persona? This question will soon

40:08

become an obsession, meeting her down a dangerous path of no

40:12

return.

40:15

A few months after

40:17

the trial, Christie Smythe sits across

40:19

from Martin at a bar near his

40:21

apartment. He probably agrees to chat

40:23

with her because Well, he's been charged when security's fraud

40:25

and let's face it. He needs an

40:28

ally in the media.

40:30

According to Christie, Martin says that he wants

40:32

someone to

40:34

write the truth about him. That jerk, he's a jerk,

40:36

but he's innocent. But he

40:38

hasn't agreed to an on the record interview

40:42

just yet This is just a warm up. Over

40:44

wine and

40:44

snacks, Martin shares about his Theres.

40:46

How he skipped the first grade

40:49

because he was so smart, only to feel lonely

40:52

and out of step with his peers.

40:54

Christie later says that as

40:56

a kid, Martin got anxiety attacks that were so bad. His family

40:58

took him to the hospital because he thought he was

41:00

dying. Chrissy also says that she

41:02

grew up with anxiety and feelings

41:04

and not lunging.

41:06

And she leaves the interview confused by

41:08

her own feelings. Has

41:10

Martin Martin charmed

41:13

her? This is a

41:16

plague that hasn't been cast

41:18

upon women all over

41:20

the world. We're talking to

41:22

a man and finding

41:24

anything he says remotely relatable

41:26

translates into a deeper

41:29

connection. And it's very

41:31

unfortunate for Christie that this

41:33

man happens to be Martin

41:36

Yeah. I mean, Sarah, I don't wanna spoil

41:38

too much because there's another episode about

41:40

this next week Amanda

41:41

it's even juicier.

41:43

But what

41:43

I will say is that the meeting goes well and

41:46

Martin agrees to meet Christie

41:48

again this time at the

41:50

Turing office. He continues to dangle the possibility of giving her a

41:52

real interview. But Christy's

41:54

frustrated. She can't write about

41:56

anything he says if this is all off

41:58

the record.

41:59

After the

42:00

meeting, they keep in touch by a phone and email,

42:02

and Martin keeps playing cat

42:04

and mouse. Christie is Ricky.

42:08

It seems like Martin Scrrelli represents so much

42:10

to her. The scoop of a lifetime,

42:12

a story she can really own, maybe

42:14

she can even turn it into a

42:17

book. which would probably open

42:18

a lot of other doors for her.

42:20

Unfortunately,

42:20

which he thinks is her

42:23

meal ticket is actually her

42:25

downfall. Christy is about to get pulled in by

42:27

Martin's powerful personality, and she'll

42:29

lose her journalistic credibility

42:32

and so so

42:34

much more.

42:40

If you

42:41

like our show, please give us a five

42:43

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42:45

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listening right now. Join Wonderry

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Plus in the Wonderry app to listen

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42:56

episode notes, you'll find some links and offers from

42:58

our

42:58

sponsors. Please support them. By

43:00

supporting them, you'll help us offer you

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the show for free. Another way you can support the show

43:04

is by filling out a small survey at

43:07

wundery dot com slash

43:10

survey. This is There's

43:12

something about Martin part one.

43:15

I'm Martin and

43:18

Sarah Hagee. We used many sources in our research, a few that

43:22

were