The Justice Department sold the only existing copy of the Wu-Tang Clan album Once Upon a Time in Shaolin after confiscating the record from disgraced pharmaceutical executive Martin Shkreli.
Once Upon a Time in Shaolin was originally purchased by Shkreli for $2 million in 2015 after the seminal rap group put the album up for auction. The album includes “a hand-carved nickel-silver box as well as a leather-bound manuscript containing lyrics and a certificate of authenticity,” according to the Justice Department.
The agency has not released the new owner’s identity or how much the individual paid for it.
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“I tried to signify how much hip-hop, rap music sort of meant to me,” Shkreli said about the purchase in an interview after the auction. He described the money he paid as a donation to the Wu-Tang Clan and said the headlines surrounding the auction would hopefully drive renewed interest in the 1990s rap group.
Shkreli was found guilty in federal court on two counts of securities fraud and one count of securities fraud conspiracy in 2017 after manipulating drug prices and attempting to defraud investors, according to the Justice Department. Shkreli was sentenced to seven years imprisonment, and a judge ordered him to pay a $75,000 fine and close to $7.4 million in forfeiture. The U.S. government seized the album along with other assets as substitutes for portions of the restitution payments.
“Through the diligent and persistent efforts of this Office and its law enforcement partners, Shkreli has been held accountable and paid the price for lying and stealing from investors to enrich himself. With today’s sale of this one-of-a-kind album, his payment of the forfeiture is now complete,” stated Jacquelyn Kasulis, the acting U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York.
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In the lead-up to the 2016 election, Shkreli tweeted if then-candidate Donald Trump won, he would release the entirety of his “unreleased music collection, including unheard Nirvana, Beatles, and of course, Wu-Tang,” according to Stereogum. He did not follow up on this promise despite Trump’s victory.
The complete contents of the album have never been released to the public, though Shkreli has in the past live-streamed small portions of its music.
