Andrew Madoff, RIP
Those of you who follow this blog know that I’ve said from the start that I don’t think Bernie Madoff’s sons were guilty, and that they were among Madoff’s biggest victims because he stole their good name from them as he duped them. They endured the horror of suddenly realizing the magnitude of what he had done, and of having to turn their own father in to the authorities, only to have the world believe them guilty of complicity in his crimes.
Many readers considered me a naive dupe myself for saying I believed them not guilty (my posts and comments on the subject are here, here, and here). Of course they were guilty; why couldn’t I see that? But since the scandal first came out, not a scintilla of credible evidence of their guilt has emerged, despite lawsuits and an intense search to find it. Everything I have read—and I’ve read plenty—has only solidified my opinion that they were innocent victims of their sociopathic father.
One of the worst developments in the family saga was the 2010 suicide of Madoff’s son Mark, which I wrote about here. It was ironic that, of Madoff’s two sons, it was Mark who was physically healthy and his brother Andrew who had suffered from cancer in 2003 and achieved a remission. Now comes the news that Andrew has died of that cancer at the age of 48:
In 2013, a judge in England dismissed a case against Mark and Andrew Madoff, ruling that they neither “knew of, or suspected, the fraud” and that “their honesty and integrity has been vindicated.”
Diana B. Henriques, a reporter who covered the Madoff case for the New York Times, noted in her 2011 book about the story, “The Wizard of Lies,” that if the sons were guilty, they might have fled – and that they had not.
“From the very beginning of this whole episode,” Andrew Madoff told Safer, “˜I’ve been eager, I would say almost desperate, to speak out publicly and tell people that I’m absolutely not involved.”
So now both Madoff offspring are dead. Andrew was the one who had stopped talking with his mother because she had initially supported the father, although Andrew finally began talking to her again after his brother committed suicide and she repudiated her husband.
Andrew also referred to what happened as a “father-son betrayal of biblical proportions.” I agree wholeheartedly. I would add that there are some Greek tragedies with happier endings than this.
Very sad indeed. The Frontline episode on Bernie Madoff was one of the most interesting I’ve ever seen. The scope of people that were duped. The obvious clues that something was seriously amiss. The financier who had his employee run through numbers and discover within a couple of hours what was happening and notifying the SEC. The SEC’s ignorance and incompetance causing a 10 year delay in dealing with that information. Money has a powerful way of exposing human psychological behaviour.
Sharon…
When I found securities law infractions — I knew better than to call the SEC.
This must be a shocker to the general public, but the SEC is NOT an enforcement agency.
It’s a paper mill.
If you EVER spot securities fraud call the REAL POLICE: the NASD.
Established circa 1939 — the NASD is the day-to-day cop on the securities beat, NOT THE SEC.
This function is actually written into Federal law.
The NASD is considered a “national self-regulatory agency” — it, and the statute, were created for each other.
It’s the NASD that fines brokers, kicks brokers out of the profession, revokes their licenses, (Series 7 — not a state license at all) and is the complete source for broker spankings and routine frauds.
Whomever called the SEC didn’t know the business — very well.
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In my case, as a Registered Investment Advisor, I called the NASD to highlight a fraud upon my clients.
I had to walk the green attorney through all aspects of the case. It took an hour and a half of phone time — with her wrist become fatigued.
Six months later I read in Barrons that my villain had pleaded guilty — straight up. He got 60 months in prison and was banned from the securities industry for life.
He’d been caught (by me) ‘slamming the close.’
Even before I complained, the gal admitted that the stock involved had already been flagged by the NASD computer for aberrant trading activity at the close. She just didn’t know the first thing about what was up with the stock.
In the fullness of time, the stock turned out to be a Mafia fraud.
For those green to Wall Street, the Mafia has figured out that securities fraud is the best payout of all.
The Mafia was MASSIVELY involved – both Sicilian and Russian – back in the 2008 debacles. Even at this time, the Mob has FTDs floating around the system (DTCC) by the million. They function in every way like counterfeit currency — but don’t generate a spanking once you’re on the inside.
Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depository_Trust_%26_Clearing_Corporation
The NASD would’ve blown up Madoff in mere weeks. It was never notified until extremely late in the game.
Cute, no?
“Many readers considered me a naive dupe myself for saying I believed them not guilty ”
Good for you Neo. This is indeed a tragedy for the children and wife.
Madoff senior ruined many lives including his family’s. His sons turned him in. They were not in on the scam. Their lives came to a screeching halt. They must have struggled terribly with not being able to believe anything that they had been taught.
This story is of Shakespearian dimensions where everyone dies at the end.
Talk about the banality of evil. Who would have guessed that Madoff had no conscience and was capable of doing so much wrong on such a massive scale? Like many aircraft accidents, when the full story came out, there were several points at which the accident/fraud could have been averted, but human nature being what it is – nothing happens. Everyone tries to learn the lesson, vowing that it will never happen again. But in the financial industry there seems to be a lack of institutional memory or the lessons are forgotten and it eventually happens all over again.
It’s not just Shakespearian, it’s Biblical.
I can easily re-imagine the story as a parable in either the old or new testament.
Can any emotional blow be more devastating than betrayal by your father? I can’t imagine anything worse. The suicide by the one son is understandable and entirely forgivable.
See Tangled Webs by James Stewart. It’s about lies in public affairs, referring to Madoff, Barry Bonds, Martha Stewart, and Scooter Libby.
He is an excellent writer in laying out the complexities of the securities world. What was interesting is the number of times authorities visited Madoff to investigate and walked away either satisfied or confused.
An acquaintance in the field said Madoff had a good business model. “Convince me I should let you invest with me.” Like flies.
Severely Ltd. Says:
September 4th, 2014 at 8:38 pm
“Can any emotional blow be more devastating than betrayal by your father? I can’t imagine anything worse. The suicide by the one son is understandable and entirely forgivable.”
It’s happened to me — and with far worse consequences than anything that happened to the Madoff sons.
You deal with it, and get on as best you can.
You will walk alone, utterly alone.
For the universal presumption is that what did happen just couldn’t happen — and that your indignation and suffering have no validity.
This is true regardless of audience.
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Psychologists have no analytical framework for parents that elevate their child to sibling status — and then re-live all of their primitive childhood conflicts — this time around winning every ‘contest.’
They don’t even have much to say about displaced marriage frustrations — thrown on a wonder child — as the two child-adults split their objectifications into: good spouse & whipping child. (In my case, literally ‘whipping boy.’)
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Having been a licensed stock broker, I find it very, very, hard to imagine Madoff’s scale of operation not being revealed to his sons over the years.
I’d start with the most peculiar auditing arrangements, as in, they didn’t have any. (real audits)
The other tip offs are too numerous to detail — but largely turn on the immense size of the fraud — AUM — and the tiny nature of the options market that Madoff claimed to be operating in.
The suicide figures to turn on social shame.
He became an urban hermit, a non-person. That would destabilize just about anybody.
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Ron Rewald,
encyclopediahttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Rewald
was Madoff, before Madoff. He operated a couple of floors up in my building.
He was so theatrical that every broker on our floor smelled a rat.
One exception: a gal with a paper mill PhD left our firm to take her clients up to Ron Rewald.
She finished herself and her clients when she did so.
Rewald’s scam also ties into the Dunham family — as in with Barry’s grandmother. But that’s another story for another day.
One thing is for certain, Barry Soetoro is going to become a minor industry — just cranking out corrective biographies for himself and his extended family.