Madoff victim fund covers most Ponzi scheme losses: DOJ
Financier Bernard Madoff leaves Manhattan Federal Court on March 10, 2009 in New York. Madoff attended a hearing on the conflicting status of his legal representation in the multibillion-dollar fraud claims.
Chris Hondros | Getty Images
10th and final distribution from the fund for victims of the deceased Ponzi scheme king Bernie Madoff started on monday Ministry of Justice he said.
The latest payment of more than $131 million is being sent to more than 23,000 victims worldwide. Once this is complete, more than $4.3 billion will be distributed by the fund to more than 40,000 victims in nearly 130 countries, the DOJ said.
This represents approximately 94% of total estimated fraud losses, the department said.
final payment by Madoff Victim Fund It was announced nearly 16 years after Madoff’s fraud came to light.
“Today’s distribution represents an unprecedented result of victim compensation from civil forfeiture actions related to the Madoff scheme,” said FBI New York Field Office Assistant Director James Dennehy.
“These victims clearly trusted Madoff with their investments, ultimately losing significant money to his selfish scheme,” Dennehy said.
Madoff, head of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities in New York, pleaded guilty in March 2009 to 11 counts in connection with what federal prosecutors said was the world’s largest Ponzi scheme.
Madoff was sentenced to 150 years in prison for the fraud, which went on for 40 years and involved paying clients with money collected from other clients rather than with investment trading profits, as he claimed.
He died April 2021, aged 82, in a federal prison in North Carolina, nearly a year after requesting compassionate release due to terminal kidney disease.
The largest portion of the fund for Madoff’s victims, about $2.2 billion, came from a civil forfeiture recovery from the estate of now-deceased Madoff investor Jeffry Picower, the DOJ said.
It earned another 1.7 billion dollars JPMorgan Chase as a part of deferred prosecution agreement In January 2014 with the DOJ. JPMorgan Chase and its predecessor institutions acted as the primary bank through which Madoff ran his scheme, the DOJ previously said.
The rest of the victims’ fund came from “civil forfeiture actions against investor Carl Shapiro and his family, and civil and criminal forfeiture actions against Bernard L. Madoff, Peter B. Madoff and their co-conspirators,” the DOJ said Monday. .
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