June 30, 2009 | 2:12 pm

“Let Him Rot in Hell”

Posted by Rob Eshman

Larry Levine

So Madoff got 150 years.  Best interview I’ve heard on this was with an ex-con named Larry Levine, who now evidently does big business consulting with other white collar criminals on their time inside the Big House. He paints a chilling picture of what Madoff can expect inside:

Levine: Well, he was in a detention center. … He’s had a little taste of custody, but now he’s going to be living in a cell, which is going to be his permanent home and this man who lived in a penthouse for years is going to be living basically out of a two-foot by four-foot wall locker. That’s where all of his personal items are going to be stored and he’s going to be subject to being counted several times a day, possibly strip-searched. He’s not going to have any privacy, and he’s probably going to be terrified for his life because people are going to want to get to him.

He goes on to detail the kinds of people Madoff will be hanging out with until the end of his life. 

He’s going to go to a medium. And he’s going to come in contact with people that are bank robbers, killers, rapists and gang members. He’s going to be in an extremely dangerous environment and he’s going to be serving time with other people that have life sentences. Those people don’t have an out date either. So if things jump off, they’re not going to hesitate to do something to Bernie. They don’t care. What can you possibly do to somebody who is serving a life that’s not getting out anyway? Nothing.

Levine makes his living consulting with these prisoners and their families.  But when the interviewer asks him if he’d help with Madoff, his response is just heartwarming:

I wouldn’t help the guy out because I view him as an economic terrorist. If you rip off a bank and insurance company, an institution, that’s an acceptable crime. Bernie hurt people. He hurt people individually and I refuse to help people like that. Let him rot in hell.

Perfect. Amen.

Read the whole interview here.

June 29, 2009 | 12:41 pm

Madoff Gets 150 Years in Prison

Posted by JewishJournal.com

Photo courtesy U.S. Dept. of Justice

by Jacob Berkman, JTA

Bernard Madoff was sentenced to 150 years in jail, the maximum sentence allowed for his crimes.

U.S. District Court Judge Denny Chin during Monday’s sentencing called Madoff’s crimes “staggering.”

Madoff, 71, confessed to bilking investors of up to $65 billion in his Ponzi scheme.

Prosecutors had sought the 150-year sentence. Madoff’s lawyers had asked for leniency and a 12-year sentence.

Chin noted that not one of Madoff’s friends or family members asked for leniency for Madoff, and that Madoff had not fully cooperated in the investigation into his crimes, according to the Washington Post.

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June 29, 2009 | 12:20 pm

The Sentencing of Bernie Madoff

Posted by JewishJournal.com

From HuffingtonPost.com:

Victims who lost millions of dollars in the multibillion-dollar fraud perpetrated by Bernard Madoff described their ruined lives Monday to the judge sentencing the 71-year-old former Nasdaq stock market chairman.

Madoff, wearing a dark suit, white shirt and a tie, sat and listened as emotional witnesses described how he spoiled their security, and they urged U.S. District Judge Denny Chin to send him to prison for life. Read the full story at HuffingtonPost.com.

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June 24, 2009 | 3:53 pm

Can You Say “Chutzpah?”

Posted by Rob Eshman

Story just broke that Madoff asked his judge at sentencing for 12 years for committing the LARGEST FRAUD IN HISTORY.

Madoff’s attorney calls it an “effective life sentence” since Madoff is now 71 years old:

Bernard Madoff asked a federal judge this week to sentence him to as little as 12 years in prison after he pleaded guilty earlier this year to operating a massive, decades- long Ponzi scheme.

In a letter filed late Monday and made public Tuesday, Ira Sorkin, a lawyer for Madoff, asked U.S. District Judge Denny Chin to sentence his client to less than a life sentence.

“Mr. Madoff is currently 71 years old and has an approximate life expectancy of 13 years,” Sorkin said. “A prison term of 12 years — just short of an effective life sentence — will sufficiently address the goals of deterrence, protecting the public and promoting respect for the law without being greater than necessary to achieve them.”

Sentencing is set for Monday.

I know plenty of healthy, hearty 83 year-old Jewish men.  Madoff’s victims made clear during the sentencing phase that they want him to die in jail—a pnishment that many still consider too kind.

Meanwhile, here’s my big unanswered question:  what’s with his sons? 

Read the rest of the Denver Post story here.

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