Bernard Madoff

Someday, Bernard Madoff will die in prison, as he should. That's not to gloat over the 150-year sentence that Madoff, 71, received yesterday from a federal judge. Even though it is richly deserved. The sentence is a measure of justice for Madoff's victims, who are now assured that the swindler will spend the rest of his days being denied the lavish lifestyle he fueled with their investments. The victims aren't likely to get much, if any, of their life savings back. Madoff had asked for a sentence of 12 years.

MIAMI - More art, artifacts and other items that once belonged to convicted swindler Bernard Madoff are being auctioned in South Florida. The auction is set for next Saturday at the Miami Beach Convention Center. The U.S. Marshals Service says the items are the last remaining from Madoff's homes in New York and Palm Beach. Proceeds will go to compensate victims of Madoff's $65 billion Ponzi scheme. He's serving a 150-year prison sentence. A Marshals Service spokesman says sales of Madoff assets and property so far have brought in more than $103 million.

Stanley Chais, 84, a once-esteemed investment manager and philanthropist whose reputation was marred by accusations he steered hundreds of millions of his clients' dollars to con man Bernard Madoff, died Sunday in New York, his wife said. Pamela Chais declined to disclose the cause of death. A spokeswoman for New York City's medical examiner said he died of natural causes. Mr. Chais had moved to New York in recent years, where he was undergoing treatment for myelodysplasia, a blood disorder.

Bernard Madoff's expected guilty plea today must not end the government's efforts to find answers - and more potential culprits - in the biggest financial fraud in history. The 70-year-old Madoff deserves what amounts to a life sentence for defrauding 4,800 investors with his high-flying Ponzi scheme. He should go to jail immediately to await sentencing, not bide his time in a $7 million Park Avenue penthouse. This stunning saga should not end with Madoff's guilty plea. Prosecutors must dig deeper into how this scheme was carried out. As more details emerge about how Madoff scammed investors and evaded regulators for more than 20 years, it seems increasingly likely that he had help.

NEW YORK - The trustee appointed to unravel disgraced Wall Street financier Bernard Madoff's massive fraud sought approval on Wednesday to distribute recovered funds for the first time to the victims. Trustee Irving Picard told a Manhattan bankruptcy court he is planning a $2.6 billion allocation, including an initial payout of $272 million. It was unclear when the court would rule. Madoff, 73, is serving a 150-year prison sentence in Butner, N.C., after admitting that his investment advisory service was a giant Ponzi scheme, using money from new investors to pay returns to existing clients while financing a lavish lifestyle for him and cheating rich people, charities, celebrities and institutional investors.

U.S. Rep. Paul Kanjorski says the Madoff scandal is a case study in why the U.S. financial system - from equities to bonds to insurance - needs to be reregulated. The Northeastern Pennsylvania Democrat, who survived an election battle last month that threatened to end his 24-year career in Congress, now finds himself closely involved in the biggest story in America. As chairman of the House Financial Services subcommittee on capital markets, Kanjorski will hold a series of hearings starting in the new year on how federal regulators missed the $50 billion Ponzi scheme put together over years by the financier Bernard Madoff.

Councilman tells of bullying ordeals A city councilman in Fort Worth, Texas, has rocketed into cyberspace prominence in a video pleading with gay teens not to commit suicide and tearfully recounting his own ordeals as a bullied schoolboy. "Give yourself a chance to see how much life will get better," Councilman Joel Burns says in his appeal to bullied teens, which he made during a 12-minute speech to the council Tuesday. By Friday afternoon, the video had received more than 500,000 hits on YouTube.

Rafael Furcal reached a preliminary agreement yesterday on a $33 million, three-year contract that will keep him with the Los Angeles Dodgers. Just one day earlier, the shortstop had been close to accepting a $30 million, three-year offer from the Atlanta Braves, his original major-league team. Furcal will get $7.5 million next season, $9.5 million in 2010 and $13 million in 2011, a source told the Associated Press. The deal includes a $13 million team option for 2012 with a $3 million buyout, and the option could become guaranteed depending on his performance.

Wall Street depends on a foundation of trust, but that trust has been squandered in a year investors would rather forget. The latest outrage could be the largest case of securities fraud in U.S. history. It is the tale of former Nasdaq chairman Bernard Madoff, who is accused of defrauding wealthy clients and others out of up to $50 billion. Neither hedge-fund managers nor regulators at the Securities and Exchange Commission seemed suspicious of Madoff's consistently high returns.

I WANT TO thank columnist Stu Bykofsky for feeling a sense of guilt regarding what Bernard Madoff did, but I'm also here to reassure him that it isn't necessary. I grew up among Jews, and often say I'd switch to being Jewish if it weren't for the food. (Want some more gefilte fish? I think not, thank you.) I also think this "group guilt" thing is good. Being a "sort of Catholic," I have my own. Just don't go overboard with it. It ain't your fault. And it ain't your people's fault either.

MIAMI - More art, artifacts and other items that once belonged to convicted swindler Bernard Madoff are being auctioned in South Florida. The auction is set for next Saturday at the Miami Beach Convention Center. The U.S. Marshals Service says the items are the last remaining from Madoff's homes in New York and Palm Beach. Proceeds will go to compensate victims of Madoff's $65 billion Ponzi scheme. He's serving a 150-year prison sentence. A Marshals Service spokesman says sales of Madoff assets and property so far have brought in more than $103 million.

NEW YORK - The trustee appointed to unravel disgraced Wall Street financier Bernard Madoff's massive fraud sought approval on Wednesday to distribute recovered funds for the first time to the victims. Trustee Irving Picard told a Manhattan bankruptcy court he is planning a $2.6 billion allocation, including an initial payout of $272 million. It was unclear when the court would rule. Madoff, 73, is serving a 150-year prison sentence in Butner, N.C., after admitting that his investment advisory service was a giant Ponzi scheme, using money from new investors to pay returns to existing clients while financing a lavish lifestyle for him and cheating rich people, charities, celebrities and institutional investors.

Councilman tells of bullying ordeals A city councilman in Fort Worth, Texas, has rocketed into cyberspace prominence in a video pleading with gay teens not to commit suicide and tearfully recounting his own ordeals as a bullied schoolboy. "Give yourself a chance to see how much life will get better," Councilman Joel Burns says in his appeal to bullied teens, which he made during a 12-minute speech to the council Tuesday. By Friday afternoon, the video had received more than 500,000 hits on YouTube.

Stanley Chais, 84, a once-esteemed investment manager and philanthropist whose reputation was marred by accusations he steered hundreds of millions of his clients' dollars to con man Bernard Madoff, died Sunday in New York, his wife said. Pamela Chais declined to disclose the cause of death. A spokeswoman for New York City's medical examiner said he died of natural causes. Mr. Chais had moved to New York in recent years, where he was undergoing treatment for myelodysplasia, a blood disorder.

KENNETH CALVIN "K.C. " White has good feelings about the Butner Federal Correctional Complex, in Butner, N.C., from which he was released last month. K.C. earned his GED at Butner. Kicked his addictions. Found ways to express his phenomenal artistic talent. And - this is key - he befriended Bernard Madoff at Butner. K.C. hopes that his meeting with the notorious convicted Ponzi schemer will give him what he needs most as he tries to establish a new life in Philly, 400 miles from the prison where he met Madoff: cash.

Someday, Bernard Madoff will die in prison, as he should. That's not to gloat over the 150-year sentence that Madoff, 71, received yesterday from a federal judge. Even though it is richly deserved. The sentence is a measure of justice for Madoff's victims, who are now assured that the swindler will spend the rest of his days being denied the lavish lifestyle he fueled with their investments. The victims aren't likely to get much, if any, of their life savings back. Madoff had asked for a sentence of 12 years.

Michael T. DeVita exited the federal courthouse in the financial district yesterday and flashed a victory signal to a mob of onlookers, TV news crews, and security personnel, signaling his great pleasure at the 150-year prison sentence issued to The Great Swindler. "We finally won a round, which was making sure that Bernie Madoff never walks again as a free man," said DeVita, a 59-year-old Chalfont, Bucks County, resident who lost more than $1 million in funds that were to have financed his retirement.

Bernard Madoff's expected guilty plea today must not end the government's efforts to find answers - and more potential culprits - in the biggest financial fraud in history. The 70-year-old Madoff deserves what amounts to a life sentence for defrauding 4,800 investors with his high-flying Ponzi scheme. He should go to jail immediately to await sentencing, not bide his time in a $7 million Park Avenue penthouse. This stunning saga should not end with Madoff's guilty plea. Prosecutors must dig deeper into how this scheme was carried out. As more details emerge about how Madoff scammed investors and evaded regulators for more than 20 years, it seems increasingly likely that he had help.

I WANT TO thank columnist Stu Bykofsky for feeling a sense of guilt regarding what Bernard Madoff did, but I'm also here to reassure him that it isn't necessary. I grew up among Jews, and often say I'd switch to being Jewish if it weren't for the food. (Want some more gefilte fish? I think not, thank you.) I also think this "group guilt" thing is good. Being a "sort of Catholic," I have my own. Just don't go overboard with it. It ain't your fault. And it ain't your people's fault either.

The fallout from the Bernard Madoff scandal continues, with several local nonprofits potentially facing gaps in their budgets as a result of an alleged multibillion-dollar pyramid scheme. The groups - including the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Juvenile Law Center - were partly funded by two foundations that have gone belly-up because the philanthropies' assets were managed by Madoff. Rebecca Rimel, Pew's president and chief executive officer, said the nonprofit would lose about $3 million pledged by the JEHT Foundation, a New York-based foundation that worked on justice and election issues.