Federal judge bans Martin Shkreli from the pharmaceutical industry for life, orders him to pay $64.6 million fine

• A judge reached a ruling in a lawsuit against former pharmaceutical executive Martin Shkreli Friday.
• Shkreli was accused of hiking up the price of a life-saving drug.

Former pharmaceutical executive Martin Shkreli was handed a lifetime ban from the industry and ordered to pay a $64.6 million fine, according to a federal judge's ruling on Friday.

Shkreli was sued in January 2020 for allegedly violating antitrust rules over fixing the price of the anti-parasitic drug Daraprim and delaying "the entry of generic competition for at least eighteen months," according to the ruling.

US District Judge Denise Cote said in a 135-page ruling that Shkreli's "egregious, deliberate, repetitive, long-running, and ultimately dangerous illegal conduct" warranted the stiff penalty.

The so-called "Pharma Bro" — who was also a former hedge fund manager before launching his career in pharmaceuticals — was previously convicted of securities fraud and is serving seven years in prison.

He also faces a new lawsuit filed last year by health insurers accusing him of illegally hiking the price of Daraprim from $17.50 to $750 per tablet once acquiring the rights to the drug in 2015.

Daraprim, according to the lawsuit, is "an essential, life-saving drug used in the treatment of toxoplasmosis."

The 38-year-old got his start in the pharmaceutical industry in 2011 as the founder of biotech firm Retrophin, according to BBC, but was soon removed from the company in 2014 following legal disputes.

"Americans can rest easy because Martin Shkreli is a 'pharma bro' no more," New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a Friday statement.

Shkreli's attorney, Christopher Casey, did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.