“Pharma bro” Martin Shkreli made headlines this week when he was ordered by a judge to return copies he’d made of Wu-Tang Clan’s ultra-rare Once Upon a Time in Shaolin album.

Shkreli has long been a controversial figure, after Turing Pharmaceuticals, the company he was CEO of at the time, bought the manufacturing licence for the antiparasitic drug Daraprim in 2015 and raised its price from $13.50 to $750 per pill.

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The same year, Shkreli purchased Once Upon a Time in Shaolin, a somewhat mythical 31-track hip-hop album of which only one copy existed at the time. 

In 2017, Shkreli was found guilty of two counts of securities fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud, sentenced to seven years in prison in 2018, and later forced to forfeit his assets. One of them was Once Upon a Time in Shaolin, which was auctioned by the US government to NFT collective PleasrDAO for $4 million. But after he livestreamed the album on X earlier this year, Shkreli revealed himself to still be in possession of copies of the album. A breach of his forfeiture order, Shkreli has been ordered to hand over any copies of the album he owns by the end of this week.

Below, we chart the timeline of Once Upon a Time in Shaolin, how it got into and out of Shkreli’s hands, and where it is now.

Once Upon a Time in Shaolin recorded – 2007 – 2013

The 7th studio album by Wu-Tang Clan, Once Upon a Time in Shaolin was recorded in secret over a period of six years between 2007 and 2013. Only one 2CD copy was pressed in 2014, which was then stored in a secure vault at the Royal Mansour Hotel in Casablanca, Morocco, until its sale a year later.

Once Upon a Time in Shaolin purchased by Martin Shkreli for $2 million – 2015

After a year in storage at the Royal Mansour Hotel, the album was sold via online auction house Paddle8 in 2015 to winning bidder Martin Shkreli, who reportedly paid $2 million. The album was sold to Shkreli with a legal agreement stipulating that it couldn’t be commercially exploited – sold or distributed – until 2103.

Martin Shkreli convicted of securities fraud – 2017

Shkreli was originally arrested by the FBI in 2015 on securities fraud charges. They were related to his tenure at MSMB Capital Management – an asset management company he co-founded – and alleged he “ran his company like a Ponzi scheme”. He was found guilty of two counts of securities fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud, and subsequently sentenced to seven years in prison.

Shkreli forced to forfeit assets – 2018

Following his conviction, Martin Shkreli was forced to forfeit nearly $7.4 million in assets, including the Once Upon a Time in Shaolin album, along with other high-profile art pieces, like a piece by Pablo Picasso, and Lil Wayne’s then-unreleased album Tha Carter V.

Once Upon a Time in Shaolin sold by US government to NFT collectors PleasrDAO – 2021

After Martin Shkreli was forced to forfeit Once Upon a Time in Shaolin, the album was sold by the US government to NFT collectors PleasrDAO – who said they wanted to make the album more publicly accessible – for $4 million.

Martin Shkreli revealed to have made copies of the album before it was sold – 2024

On 9 June, 2024, Martin Shkreli livestreamed the album to an audience of around 5,000 on X. The album’s owners PleasrDAO then sued him for playing it publicly without permission, saying the album’s value had been diminished. A judge then issued a temporary restraining order preventing Shkreli from playing the album publicly. 

Obviously, this meant that Shkreli had to have made copies of the album before it changed from his hands to PleasrDAO’s. Now, a judge has ordered Shkreli to turn over all copies of the album he has in his possession by the end of this week.

Other Once Upon a Time in Shaolin news – 2024

The first exhibition officially offering listeners the ability to hear the album began in June at the Museum of Old and New Art in Hobart, Tasmania. Attendees were played a 30-minute mix of the album, and were made to sign a waiver promising not to record the album. The same month, PleasrDAO began selling partial ownership of the album via NFTs for $1 each. Each purchase accelerates its release date by 88 seconds.

The world's most expensive album is available for $1.

Enter the chamber and secure a copy – 2103 will come faster than you think.https://t.co/QRmGdIrwOy pic.twitter.com/rTCkuH0It3

— Pleasr (@PleasrDAO) June 13, 2024

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