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DAVID W. SHAPIRO ◼

MARTHA BOERSCH ◼

LARA KOLLIOS ◼

MATTHEW DIRKES ◼

◼ 1611 TELEGRAPH AVE SUITE 806, OAKLAND CA 94612-2147 | 415-500-6640 | BOERSCHSHAPIRO.COM ◼

January 8, 2019

Via Federal Express

U.S. Senate Select Committee on Ethics

220 Hart Building

United States Senate

Washington, DC 20510

Re: Senator Johnny Isakson

Dear Committee Members and Staff:

This is a complaint filed on behalf of Marc Cohodes, a citizen, against Senator Johnny

Isakson for causing the FBI to violate its policies regarding the First Amendment of the US

Constitution and threaten Mr. Cohodes for posting public statements about MiMedx – a company

that has donated significant amounts of money to the senator. Mr. Cohodes suspects that

MiMedx’s and its former CEO’s contributions to the senator may have constituted improper

influence. In any event, Senator Isakson’s repeated requests to the FBI resulted in a violation of

Mr. Cohodes’s First Amendment rights and other civil rights.

Background Facts

On September 19, 2017, Adam Feuerstein posted a tweet on Twitter saying, “Agenda

item #1 on Thursday's $MDXG call: ‘Short Selling Matters and Proactive Remedies’”. Marc

Cohodes re-posted the tweet and wrote, “Who is their Auditor? What a Slap Dick outfit MDXG

is”.

The next day, September 20, Aurelius Value posted an in depth report about MiMedx

exposing allegations of accounting fraud, undisclosed related party transactions, and improper

relationships between the company and podiatrists who distributed MiMedx product. Aurelius is

a well known research service that has exposed a number of fraudulent businesses.

On September 20, Mr. Cohodes posted a link to the Aurelius report, along with another

negative report written by Viceroy Research, about MiMedx. A short time after posting the

Viceroy report, Mr. Cohodes cited to the report that alleged MiMedx was involved in a kickback

and bribery scheme. He wrote, “Serious stuff in this,” referring to the Viceroy report. Based on

his view that Aurelius and Viceroy were honest and good researchers, Mr. Cohodes then posted,


January 8, 2019


“If @viceroyresearch & @AureliusValue came knocking on my door, I would come out with my

Hands in the Air. The MDXG [icon of a turkey] are just 2 bit hustlers”.

On September 21, Mr. Cohodes posted a screen shot of a MiMedx press release of that

same day, in which the company stated that it was cooperating with an SEC investigation. Petit

was quoted as saying, “[w]e have nothing to hide, and cooperated fully.” Referring to a prior

SEC inquiry, Petit said: “Within a matter of months the agency declined to intervene. We expect

to have a similar result here.”

That day, MiMedx sued the Capitol Forum for defamation, among other things, claiming

the Forum acted as a shill for short sellers by publishing an article about inquiries from the

Veteran’s Administration. MiMedx’s press release about the suit is at

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/mimedx-files-lawsuit-against-the-capitol-forum-

300523633.html. The case was entitled MiMedx Group, Inc. v. DBW Partners LLC d/b/a The

Capitol Forum, 1:17-cv-01925, and was filed in federal district court in the District of Columbia.

The Capitol Forum article on which the lawsuit was based was entitled “MiMedx: Chanel

Stuffing Accusations Resurface in Recent Counterclaim; Former Employees Corroborate

Allegations; a Close Look at Potential Risk.” Although the court only granted part of the

defendants’ motion to dismiss, MiMedx dismissed the case with prejudice on October 19, 2018.

Mr. Cohodes and others continued to post items on Twitter regarding MiMedx. These

included allegations from former employee lawsuits alleging accounting manipulations

(September 22) and reposted further allegations about MiMedx from Aurelius and Viceroy.

On September 29, 2017, Mr. Cohodes referred to a “tremendous presentation last night”

about MiMedx, “just the facts and covered even more ground than [Aurelius and Viceroy].” He

also responded to an Aurelius post that Parker Petit, the CEO of MiMedx, often cited to his

relationship with Tom Price (the now-disgraced former HHS Secretary in the Trump

administration who has been accused of misusing government resources). On September 30, Mr.

Cohodes posted that Price “was also a $MDXG shill who was tied to Pepe Le Peu “Pete” Petit”.

On October 2, Mr. Cohodes re-posted a Viceroy post about channel stuffing by MiMedx. Later

that day, Mr. Cohodes posted a photograph showing $200,000 worth of MiMedx inventory

improperly shipped to a VA facility.

During the last few weeks of September, Mr. Cohodes advised his followers that he had

again been invited to speak at Grant’s Interest Rate Observer conference in October 2017.

Grant’s is a well respected publication founded by James Grant. It is regarded as one of the

leading analyst publications in this country. Its annual conference includes the most respected

short-biased investors. Mr. Cohodes is one of the few (and perhaps only) people to be invited to

speak two years in a row.

The Grant’s conference was scheduled for October 10, 2017. As that date neared,

MiMedx and its CEO Petit became concerned that Mr. Cohodes’s voluble criticism of the


January 8, 2019


company and his high profile and respect in the marketplace would negatively affect MiMedx’s

share price. Mr. Cohodes attended that conference and spoke about MiMedx.

FBI’s Recent Disclosure of Communications from Senator Isakson

A recent FBI disclosure in response to a FOIA request reveals that on some date before

October 13, 2017, Senator Johnny Isakson called the FBI Office of Congressional Affairs to

make a “victim referral.” The FBI agent said that even though s/he “ordinarily” refers such

complaints to the FBI’s hotline, the agent apparently treated this complaint differently (though

the substance of the FBI’s response has been redacted). Several FBI agents exchanged

information about the complaint, and then, on October 16, 2017, an attorney called the FBI to

complain about something related to the original MiMedx complaint (again much is redacted).

The complaints from MiMedx about Mr. Cohodes to the FBI continued. On November

17, 2017 Senator Isakson emailed someone (the name is redacted) about a conversation “we” had

with an unnamed FBI Agent. On November 20, 2017, Isakson again wrote to the FBI and

provided “information” that he had received from MiMedx (although the company name is

redacted, the letter is copied to the MiMedx corporate address). On the fax cover sheet, Isakson

asked the FBI to take “all appropriate action.”

The FOIA released documents are enclosed.

The FBI Threatens Marc Cohodes at Senator Isakson’s Behest

On December 1, 2017, two FBI agents appeared at Mr. Cohodes’s home, where he lives

with his wife and disabled son. The men were coy about who they were – while they showed

Mr. and Mrs. Cohodes badges, they refused to show the couple their federal credentials. During

the course of the meeting, the agents told Mr. Cohodes to stop talking about MiMedx. They

threatened that there “would be consequences” if they had to return – a statement they repeated

in substance on the telephone to Mr. Cohodes’s lawyer (David Shapiro).

Thereafter, the FBI told Petit or others at MiMedx about their interaction with Mr.

Cohodes – a violation of the FBI’s own internal rules. We know that because Mr. Petit’s

assistant, Leana Moss, posting under the Twitter name Firebird Ruth, taunted Mr. Cohodes with

a reference to the visit in a tweet dated December 26, 2017: Could there be federal regulators

looking for you [Marc Cohodes] as Parker says? FBI maybe?” A copy of the posting is

enclosed.

Petit/MiMedx Contributions to Senator Isakson

We have learned that Parker Petit and those associated with MiMedx contributed $21,000

to Senator Isakson in the 2014 and 2016 election cycles and contributed another $15,000 to the

National Republican Senatorial Committee through Isakson’s office. Mr. Petit has referred to


January 8, 2019


Senator Isakson as “our” senator. He has used Senator Isakson multiple times to help Mr. Petit

and his business in its interactions with government regulators. “[Q]uestions are being raised

about how much help Isakson provided and whether it prompted the VA to resume using

[MiMedx] products.” https://www.ajc.com/news/national-govt--politics/isakson-went-bat-for-

mimedx-its-frustrations-with/eys8zoupQBggB2C2N2QQJI/.

Mr. Cohodes’s Complaint

MiMedx and Mr. Petit are not ordinary constituents of Senator Isakson. They are major

contributors to Isakson’s political campaigns. The senator told the Atlanta Journal constitution

that he has known Parker Petit “for going on 45 years and I’ve never known a finer guy.”

(Quoted in an October 18, 2017, open letter from Aurelius Value to Isakson and attached to this

complaint.) Senator Isakson’s assets are held in a blind trust, according to

www.opensecrets.com. The senator holds assets of about $3 million in health related stocks. If

those include MiMedx or other corporations associated with MiMedx, then it appears the senator

violated ethics rules.

In any event, Senator Isakson’s extraordinary steps to silence a critic of MiMedx should

be investigated to determine the senator’s motive and intent for doing so, as well as whether

Petit’s or others’ payments to the senator influenced the senator’s decision to ask the FBI to act

multiple times. If the senator did this as a favor to a well-connected constituent with the tacit

agreement of future payments or contributions, then that may be an ethics violation. Further, it is

a criminal violation to accept a payment for or because of any official public act performed or to

be performed by a public official. 18 U.S.C. § 201(c)(1)(A).

We will supplement this complaint in the even the FBI discloses additional information.

We request that your Committee seek direct answers from the FBI about its conduct and the

senator’s influence on its agents.

Very truly yours,

David W. Shapiro

Enclosures.

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