NEW YORK, Dec. 15, 2008
Wall Street Investment Scam Victims Emerge
Everyone From Savvy, Veteran Investors To Now-Ruined Charities Hit By Madoff Ponzi Scheme
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Play CBS Video Video $50B Scam Victims Speak Victims who lost their life savings are speaking out as investigations continue into Bernard Madoff's $50 billion investment scam that went on unnoticed for decades.
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Video Wealthy Investors Swindled Bernard Madoff, a former head of NASDAQ, was taken into custody after reportedly admitting to losing about $50 billion in investors' funds in a "Ponzi" scheme, reports Armen Keteyian.
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Video So-Called $50 Billion Scam There's a growing list of big time investors who fear their money's gone in what prosecutors say was a $50 billion scam run by respected Wall Street guru Bernard Madoff. Armen Keteyian reports.
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Bernard L. Madoff (AP/New York Times)
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Attorneys Stephen Weiss, left, of Seeger Weiss LLP and Brad Friedman of Milberg LLP each representing dozens of clients of Bernard L. Madoff arrive at Manhattan federal court, Dec.12, 2008, in New York. (AP Photo/Louis Lanzano)
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Richard Grasso, president, New York Stock Exchange, left, joined by former Security and Exchange Commission Chairman, center, and Bernard Madoff, chairman of Madoff Investment Securities before the House subcommittee on Telecommunications and Finance on Thursday, May 13, 1993 in Washington. (AP Photo)
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Interactive Cracking Down SEC investigations, a new task force at the Justice Department, action in Congress...learn about who's doing what to catch white-collar criminals.
Around the world, investors who sunk cash into veteran Wall Street money manager Madoff's investment pool spent the weekend calculating how much exposure they might have. The 70-year-old Madoff, well respected in the investment community after serving as chairman of the Nasdaq Stock Market, was arrested Thursday in what prosecutors say was a $50 billion scheme to defraud investors.
Retired West Palm Beach, Fla. couple Joan and Arnold Sinkin lost their life savings in the scheme. "Our life is upside down," Joan told CBS' The Early Show.
Her husband added, "It's like a bad dream. We're bankrupt."
But the victims of Madoff's scheme are not just retired Floridians who invested their life savings. Rather, financial institutions, charities and savvy investors - who supposedly knew what they were doing - were all taken in by the fiendish scam.
"There were a lot of very sophisticated people who were duped, and that happens a great deal when you've had somebody decide to be unscrupulous," said Harvey Pitt, a former chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, a regulator in charge of monitoring investment funds like the one Madoff operated.
"It isn't just the big investors," he said. "There's a lot of charitable and foundation money involved in this, which is the real tragedy."
"Madoff has just hurt so many innocent people who really didn't deserve to be hurt," Braman, former owner of the Philadelphia Eagles, says.
Braman joins an ever-widening circle of victims in the $50 billion Ponzi scheme. Including:
"The money needed to fund the programs of the Lappin Foundation is gone," it said. "The foundation staff has been terminated today."
All of this raising questions as to how the SEC could have investigated Madoff in 2007 - without bringing charges.
"The question is what did they see, what did they know, and why did the investigation close?" says former SEC attorney Jacob Frankel.
At Madoff's securities firm in Manhattan a small squadron of investigators was digging through records. Trying to determine if, as some believe, money is stashed overseas, and whether or not Madoff could have cooked a complicated set of books - as he claimed - all by himself.
"It's hard to believe one person could have pulled off such a large fraud," Frankel said.
Already two charitable foundations have shut down; and many in Palm Beach are reportedly putting jewels, and even these condos up for sale, Keteyian reports. The price of trusting a man destined, it appears, to set a whole new standard for fraud.
Meanwhile, a federal judge has signed an order saying investors who may have been duped need the protection of the Securities Investor Protection Act.
Judge Louis Stanton also directed that proceedings to liquidate the assets of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC be moved to bankruptcy court.
The order was signed Monday afternoon after the Securities Investor Protection Corp. submitted papers asking for the protection for investors.
Stanton assigned Irvin Picard to preside as trustee over the liquidation.
The order came just days after federal prosecutors charged Madoff with securities fraud.
© MMVIII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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- I read it "Piled High & Deep".
Posted by Besscannon
Actually it''s "Piled Higher and Deeper." - Reply to this comment
- All the right wing LOSERS on this board seem to be doing is justifying Bush/Cheney administration''s total financial catastrophe and/or passing the buck on to Clintons tenure (Clinton left with a surplus).
The last 8 years have the dubious distinction to be the most FRAUDULENT Presidency in the history of the country. Makes me want to vomit. - Reply to this comment
- You all know what PHD stands for, don''t you? I read it "Piled High & Deep".
- Reply to this comment
- WestPhillypa, I am assuming, since you think Obama is dumb, that you have a PhD in mathematics from MIT? Am I correct?
- Reply to this comment
- ahhhhaaaa111, I reported you for abusing this site. Your postings reflect poorly on those of us who might prefer intelligent dialogue. They are a hindrance.
- Reply to this comment
- ahhhhaaaa111 -- There''s a "caps lock" key on the left side of your keyboard. Either you accidentally punched it or you feel the need to scream at everyone ... over and over and over and over and ... you don''t even know what you''re talking about.
- Reply to this comment
- [Just remember folks...the last thing we need is more banking and investment regulation...it will kill business innovation!]
[Posted by torva at 05:46 PM : Dec 15, 2008]
if by innovation you mean new ways to create complex financial instruments nobody can understand ... or to just rip off those who have the money you want ... then yes ... new regulation will put the kibosh on that. - Reply to this comment
- "Retired West Palm Beach, Fla. couple Joan and Arnold Sinkin lost their life savings in the scheme. "Our life is upside down," Joan told CBS'' The Early Show."
Let me guess, you believed in Charlie "what''s good for GM is good for America" Wilson, and you voted for every trickle down neocon, from "Business can do no wrong" Nixon to "bust the unions" Reagan to "Deregulation" Bush, and blamed the misery of the lower and middle classes on "laziness", right?
Welcome. Abandon all hope, ye who enter. - Reply to this comment
- It will be entertaining to see people who voted for unregulated capitalism, and against any programs to help the lower and middle classes have to live with the fruit of their desires.
Let us hear the rousing anti-welfare, anti- public assistance, "go-get-a-job-you-lazy-poor-people" and "why should my tax dollars go to people who won''t work" chorus from the soon to be on the street living right wing! - Reply to this comment
- Well, could of been worst. The victims lost their investments. But if they had been involved with *** "the rat" Cheney''s Enron Scandel, the people involved would have lost justice (no jail time for Dicky), their entire retirment; and their jobs. White House involve are bigger scandels.
- Reply to this comment
- Seems greed got everyone in this scheme.
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- ahhhhhaaaaaaa........I agree with your opinion but don''t need to see it 50 times. Grow up. That kind of behavior destroys these forums. Are you doing that as a false flag to discredit all the others?
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- FINALLY THE RICH ROBBING THE RICH!!!!!, I PRAY THAT THOSE FAT CATS AND WHALES LOST EVERYTHING!!!, IM ESTATIC AND IF SOME OF YOU FATCATS AND WHALES ARE READING THIS WELCOME TO THE WORLD OF THE POOR, UNNOTICED AND FORGOTTEN AHHHH HAAAA!!! GOOD JOB MADOFF!!!!! DONT ANYBODY, I MEAN ANYBODY SAY ANYTHING BAD ABOUT MADOFF!!! HE SHOULD BE HAILED AS A HERO, ROB EM'' MADOFF ROB EM''!!!! MAY GOD STRIKE YOU DOWN WHERE YOU STAND IF YOU HAVE ANYTHING BAD TO SAY ABOUT MADOFF!!!! ROB EM'' MADOFF!!!! ROB EM''!!!!
- Reply to this comment
- FINALLY THE RICH ROBBING THE RICH!!!!!, I PRAY THAT THOSE FAT CATS AND WHALES LOST EVERYTHING!!!, IM ESTATIC AND IF SOME OF YOU FATCATS AND WHALES ARE READING THIS WELCOME TO THE WORLD OF THE POOR, UNNOTICED AND FORGOTTEN AHHHH HAAAA!!! GOOD JOB MADOFF!!!!! DONT ANYBODY, I MEAN ANYBODY SAY ANYTHING BAD ABOUT MADOFF!!! HE SHOULD BE HAILED AS A HERO, ROB EM'''' MADOFF ROB EM''!!!! MAY GOD STRIKE YOU DOWN WHERE YOU STAND IF YOU HAVE ANYTHING BAD TO SAY ABOUT MADOFF!!!! ROB EM'' MADOFF!!!! ROB EM''!!!!
- Reply to this comment
- FINALLY THE RICH ROBBING THE RICH!!!!!, I PRAY THAT THOSE FAT CATS AND WHALES LOST EVERYTHING!!!, IM ESTATIC AND IF SOME OF YOU FATCATS AND WHALES ARE READING THIS WELCOME TO THE WORLD OF THE POOR, UNNOTICED AND FORGOTTEN AHHHH HAAAA!!! GOOD JOB MADOFF!!!!! DONT ANYBODY, I MEAN ANYBODY SAY ANYTHING BAD ABOUT MADOFF!!! HE SHOULD BE HAILED AS A HERO, ROB EM'' MADOFF ROB EM''!!!! MAY GOD STRIKE YOU DOWN WHERE YOU STAND IF YOU HAVE ANYTHING BAD TO SAY ABOUT MADOFF!!!! ROB EM'' MADOFF!!!! ROB EM''!!!!
- Reply to this comment
- DONT ANYBODY, I MEAN ANYBODY SAY ANYTHING BAD ABOUT MADOFF!!! HE SHOULD BE HAILED AS A HERO, ROB EM'' MADOFF ROB EM''!!!! MAY GOD STRIKE YOU DOWN WHERE YOU STAND IF YOU HAVE ANYTHING BAD TO SAY ABOUT MADOFF!!!! ROB EM'' MADOFF!!!! ROB EM''!!!!
- Reply to this comment
- So it looks like it was a Democrat who duped mostly other rich Democrats. A lot of donations were also made to Democrat politicians like Obama and Hillary along with left leaning organizations by this swindler. Guess how many of those politicians are going to return the large sums of money they received?
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- FINALLY THE RICH ROBBING THE RICH!!!!!, I PRAY THAT THOSE FAT CATS LOST EVERYTHING!!!, IM ESTATIC AND IF SOME OF YOU FATCATS ARE READING THIS WELCOME TO THE WORLD OF THE POOR, UNNOTICED AND FORGOTTEN AHHHH HAAAA!!! GOOD JOB MADOFF!!!!!
- Reply to this comment
- FINALLY THE RICH ROBBING THE RICH!!!!!, I PRAY THAT THOSE FAT CATS LOST EVERYTHING!!!, IM ESTATIC AND IF SOME OF YOU FATCATS ARE READING THIS WELCOME TO THE WORLD OF THE POOR, UNNOTICED AND FORGOTTEN AHHHH HAAAA!!! GOOD JOB MADOFF!!!!!
- Reply to this comment
- FINALLY THE RICH ROBBING THE RICH!!!!!, I HOPE THOSE FAT CATS LOST EVERYTHING!!!, IM ESTATIC AND IF SOME OF YOU FATCATS ARE READING THIS WELCOME TO THE WORLD OF THE POOR, UNNOTICED AND FORGOTTEN AHHHH HAAAA!!! GOOD JOB MADOFF!!!!!
- Reply to this comment
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