Martink Shkreli, the pharmaceutical “bad boy” known for hiking drug prices, has posted on Twitter his plan to auction off the opportunity to slap or punch him in the face to benefit the young son of his former PR manager and friend Mike Kulich, who died in his sleep on Saturday at age 29.
On Monday, Shkreli tweeted, “I will auction one slap/punch in the face to benefit my friend Mike who passed away & leaves behind a young son who survived cancer.” In less than three hours, Shkreli posted that he already had a high bid of $78,000. Kulich’s son has just finished chemotherapy for acute lymphocytic leukemia a month before his father died.
Shkreli plans to match some or all of the bid, and further stated that the winner could designate a third party, even Mike Tyson, to punch instead, and that the winner could also film the punch, according to The Huffington Post.
The pharmaceutical executive earned the nickname “Pharma Bro” after donning sunglasses and striking a pose in another Twitter posting, according to the New York Daily News. He later said it was a joke, was out of character for him to do, and that he didn’t like the nickname much, although it has stuck.
There may be many who would like a chance to punch Shkreli in the face after he raised the price of a crucial medication for treating infections related to AIDS from $13.50 to $750 per pill, an increase of about 5,000 percent. Shkreli was arrested in December 2015 for securities fraud related to a company run by him previously, and remains out on bail until the trial.
Shkreli also offered the option to have dinner with him instead. The Huffington Post reported that he wrote, “I know I have a lot of fans out there!”
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