Madoff sentence a $65bn miscarriage of justice
Posted on 30 June 2009 with no comments from readers
The record 150-year sentence for Bernie Madoff for stealing $65 billion from investors should not be allowed to distract attention from a grave miscarriage of justice: namely the failure of investigators to find the money or identify the other persons involved in this massive fraud.
It is almost as though heaping a large number of years in jail on one individual is supposed to be sufficient response for a crime that must have involved many people who were obviously complicit in this action.
$65bn question
How can you possibly steal $65 billion from under investors’ noses without at least somebody in the chain of institutions and individuals handling this money not understanding what was going on?
And yet that is what the US Justice Department seems to want us to conclude. How very convenient in avoiding more time-consuming and costly investigation, and how very convenient in avoiding further embarrassment to the financial community at this difficult time.
Madoff confessed to the court yesterday that he had deceived his brothers, his two sons and his wife. But could this con man-of-our-generation not be deceiving us about that too?
What he does seem to have done is to sacrifice himself to protect his family. And while a noble objective it does nothing to make repay the thousands of people who find themselves financially destroyed by the greatest con man in history.
It will have been a pretty lousy day for justice in America if that is it for the investigation. Can Madoff really have buried his trail so deep that no computer trace exists as to where the loot is buried?
Accomplices
What of the people who worked for him for years? What of the wealth that his family has accumulated over that time? One report said his wife has been reduced to living on $2.5 million. How many Madoff victims have that much left?
The whole case is of course an embarrassment to many parties, from those who unwittingly sold Madoff investments to those who suspected a problem but did nothing. However, those who knew about the fraud and profited from it all along should not be allowed to go free, just because the ring leader is serving 150 years.
