Wall Street trader Michael Lucarelli has been through his fair share of indignities ever since he was put on trial for insider trading last year. The former Director of Market Intelligence at Lippert/Heilshorn & Associates, Inc. has suffered pratfalls both literal and metaphoric—whether running from paparazzi barefoot or, yesterday, being convicted of using insider knowledge to profit over $1 million for himself. But it didn't stop there: Lucarelli got into the nitty-gritty all about his cocaine habit, his bedroom problems and his Crohn's Disease.
Lucarelli, 52, went on a long tirade in court during his sentencing hearing on Wednesday, blaming his insider trading on his predilection for cocaine, which he said he used to mitigate his Crohn's Disease. "I didn’t take the drugs to get high, I did it because I can’t drink coffee — that’s a painful trip to the bathroom," Lucarelli said.
Among other things, he blamed his former bosses for cheating him out of his commissions, he bragged about hanging out with supermodels, and he discussed getting into a fistfight with his father. The News has this excerpt:
He said that his wife, who is much younger than him, left him and moved to Florida. It all fell apart after he was hit by a taxi in 2011, he said.
“Obviously I couldn’t perform my sexual duties (after the accident) — and she’s 20 years younger — that was the beginning of my downfall,” he said.
His life story was full of indignities and abuse.
“I had a fistfight with my father at 16 which I won, so he stopped bothering me,” Lucarelli said.
He said he put himself through college in the 1980s working at Ford Models alongside the likes of Kathy Ireland.
Those days are long gone now, however. He now works as a handyman at a farmhouse, shoveling snow.
“I’m a leper to all my past friends, which maybe I deserve. I have no assets. Zero,” Lucarelli said.
Lucarelli was sentenced to two years and six months in prison. He added that he plans on becoming a truck driver in North Dakota: "The one thing about trucking, you’re urine tested all the time," he said. "If you’re a good driver, which I am, they don’t care about insider trading."
