Frank Shkreli

From early life in refugee camps, to the coveted role as director of an international broadcast agency, Shkreli’s career boomed.

Frank Shkreli was born near Ulqin, Montenegro, though his family is originally from the region of Shkreli, north of Shkodër, Albania. He attended elementary school in Kodërkollë, near Ulqin, and later, high school at a Salesian Catholic seminary in Croatia. He and his family escaped Communist Yugoslavia in 1969, and after living in refugee camps throughout Italy for more than a year, they arrived in the United States as political refugees and settled in the Bronx, New York. Upon arriving, Shkreli started working odd jobs while taking English-language courses at Fordham University. He later enrolled at Lehman College in the Bronx before moving to Washington, D.C., in June 1974. There, he started working for the Voice of America (VOA)—the U.S. government’s international broadcasting service— and continued his studies at nearby George Washington University.