Sabrdaran
Securities & Exchange Commission v. Sabrdaran
Opinion
Lead Opinion
Corley, J.
ORDER RE POST-TRIAL AND REMEDY MOTIONS
Re: Dkt. Nos. 170, 175
Plaintiff Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) charge that Defendants Sasan Sabrdaran and Farhang Afsarpour engaged in insider trading in violation of the antifraud provisions of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. Following a three-week trial, the jury returned a verdict in the SEC’s favor. Now pending before the Court are Defendants’ joint motion for judgment as a matter of law, or in the alternative, a new trial and the SEC’s post-trial remedies motion. (Dkt. Nos. 170, 175. 1 ) Having had the benefit of oral argument on March 23, 2017, and having carefully considered the parties’ written submissions, including their post-oral argument submissions, the Court DENIES Defendants’ motion and GRANTS IN PART the SEC’s remedies motion as set forth below.
BACKGROUND
The SEC alleged that Defendants engaged in insider trading when Dr. Sa-brdaran, an employee of pharmaceutical company InterMune, Inc., tipped his longtime friend Afsarpour to material, nonpublic information about the progress through the European regulatory approval process of Esbriet, one of InterMune’s products, and Afsarpour then acted on that tip by…