By Calvin Palmer
Fraudster Bernie Madoff has been sentenced to the maximum 150 years in prison for masterminding the $65 billion Ponzi scheme that threw the U.S. investment world into disrepute.
Judge Denny Chin said the sentence was a symbolic one for a crime that showed “extraordinary evil” and “took a staggering human toll”.
Madoff, addressing the court for about six minutes, said that when he started, he thought he would be able to “work my way out”. He said he lives in a tormented stated and expressed regret of leaving a “legacy of shame” to his family and grandchildren”.
Judge Chin brushed Madoff’s remorse aside and and rejected the suggestion from Madoff’s lawyers that there was a sense of “mob vengeance” surrounding calls for a long prison term.
Handing down the maximum sentence, Judge Chin said: “Objectively speaking, the fraud here was staggering. It spanned more than 20 years.”
At today’s hearing at the U.S. District Court in lower Manhattan, nine victims of Madoff’s Ponzi scheme addressed the courtroom, describing how they had been wiped out both financially and emotionally.
“How could someone do this to us?” said Dominic Ambrosino, a retired New York City corrections officer who said he lost his life savings with Madoff and was the first victim to speak. “We worked honestly and so hard.”
Another victim, Sharon Lissauer, who said she invested all of her savings with Madoff, told the court: “He should spend his whole life in jail. He’s ruined so many people’s lives. He killed my spirit and shattered my dreams.”
“This jail should become his coffin,” said 33-year-old victim Michael Schwartz, who had been investing with Madoff since he was a teen and was left with nothing.
It will be at least another three months before the judge makes a decision on repaying the victims. Prosecutors requested more time to sift through Madoff’s records to determine how much was lost and how many people are owed.
[Based on reports by ABC News and The New York Times.]
7 Comments
June 30, 2009 at 10:15 pm
Let’s hope this greedy bastard gets HARD time. No soft fall.No book deals or profit of any kind .
No plush corporate “jail” or considerations of any measure.
His fat cat wife will still be wealthy and live in luxury………!!!!!!!! A real shame that.
Greed……….an ugly skew on life.
July 1, 2009 at 12:10 am
“Greed……….an ugly skew on life.”
That’s no way to talk about Sarah Palin and her supporters.
July 1, 2009 at 12:24 am
LOL!……….ah yes…….the dear Sarah story..egad.
My favorite was her comment that Africa is a country.
The Democrats are a shoo in if the Elephants prop dear Sarah up for 2012.
Horton hears a who???????
July 1, 2009 at 1:06 am
The Democrats are a shoo-in just as long as the Republicans continue to espouse hypocrisy and double standards.
Check out the story on the Justice Department and the Swiss bank. It debunks the Republican theory about the “trickle down effect” of lower taxation.
July 2, 2009 at 11:45 pm
shoe
July 3, 2009 at 1:42 am
Sorry, I’m English. Correction made.
July 5, 2009 at 1:36 am
pip pip…….(smile)