So Bernie gets his free place in a secure retirement home, but where is the money. Perhaps the feds should start digging on Mt Sion?

Madoff starts prison sentence
By Grant McCool


NEW YORK (Reuters) - Bernard Madoff's prison life began on Tuesday, a long way from the luxury homes, sleek yachts and precious designer watches and clothes he accumulated in the years he ran Wall Street's biggest investment fraud.

Prison officials said the 71-year-old swindler checked into the Butner Federal Correctional Complex in North Carolina, where two other well-known white collar criminals, a convicted spy and a convicted bomb plotter are incarcerated.

The disgraced New York financier arrived on Tuesday morning in a prison van after being moved from a jail cell in his home city and then temporarily to a federal prison in Atlanta, a prisons spokeswoman said.

Federal Bureau of Prisons spokeswoman Linda Thomas confirmed that the prison, 45 miles northwest of Raleigh, North Carolina, was Madoff's final destination to serve the effective life sentence he received on June 29 for bilking thousands of investors from all walks of life.

A judge sentenced him to a total of 150 years on several criminal charges, including securities fraud, money laundering and perjury for a Ponzi scheme amounting to as much as $65 billion worldwide over about 20 years. A Ponzi scheme is one in which early investors are paid with money from new clients.

Madoff has spent the last four months in the Manhattan Correctional Centre next door to the courthouse where he pleaded guilty in March. He was arrested by the FBI in December after confessing to his two sons that he was a fraud.

PRISON CLOTHES

At the 3,400-inmate prison, Madoff will wear prison-issued clothing, initially be in isolation and then have a cell mate, according to those who have served time in the U.S. system. He will earn pennies a day doing menial work.

Other white-collar criminals at Butner are former Adelphia Communications executives John Rigas, 84, due for release in 2018, and his 53-year-old son, Timothy, whose term ends in 2022, according to official records.

Jonathan Pollard, an American convicted of spying for Israel, is also housed at the facility, which has several levels of security. A blind Egyptian cleric, Omar Abdel-Rahman, was moved to Butner two years ago after being sentenced to life in 1995 for a plot to bomb New York landmarks and assassinate Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

Once Madoff is settled into his new surroundings, his wife of 45 years, Ruth, will be allowed to visit him. The prison is an eight-hour drive from New York and it is not the one requested by his lawyer.

He had asked Madoff be sent a medium-security prison in Otisville, New York, about 70 miles northwest of New York City, but the bureau of prisons decides where convicts go.

On July 2, Ruth Madoff gave up the couple's luxury $7 million Manhattan penthouse apartment and its valuable contents, with proceeds eventually going to defrauded investors.

Under an agreement with U.S. prosecutors, Ruth Madoff was allowed to keep $2.5 million in cash, but she and her husband were ordered to forfeit everything else they owned, including other homes, yachts and jewellery.

but will they ever find the offshore stuff and loot that that has placed with "friends"? ...... not much chance of that

Watch CNBC tonight 23.00hrs CET and you might find out how Madoff cheated his victims.

oh we all know the how ..... it's not that difficult for it also self-generates ..... almost like pyramid selling

cynic you think you know all the answers... watch and learn.

got better things to do ..... i know very well how to get conned!

cynic its not about you, its about the many decent people being cheated out of their life savings.

yeah yeah yeah .... you are very repetitive ..... do you want to get the fact he's jewish off your chest again too? ..... must be like coughing up phlegm!

we all know lots about BM and his MO was not original either .... the only major surprise was arguably the quantum and that he got away with it for 20 years ..... it should be a surprise that SEC did not shut him down 10 years ago when it had all the necessary evidence - but of course it is no surprise at all that they failed to act at all

cynic you seem to have a "hang up" because Madoff is a jew and cheated many jews out of their life savings. Do you have some sort of a guilt complex?

why should I? ...... do you have some sort of repetitive syndrome? ...... as i have said many times before, BM is not the first and assuredly will not be the last ..... as always, many small fish get badly hurt or even ruined, though in this instance, a surprisingly large number of high profile individuals and charities also got chomped ..... a prog on the story is cheap to produce and will bring a high viewing audience (not me ... wouldn't watch anyway, but off to hospital visit) but will not actually make any difference

cynic that's where you are wrong the CNBC programme will make a difference by making ordinary people more aware of what to look out for when they are being persuaded to trust others with their hard earned savings. Can't understand why you persist in defending Madoff by suggesting it is alright for "small fish" to be ruined.

Madoff is a serious criminal and we musn't forget the poor victims of his wrong doings....honest hard working people people, some who have trust millions of dollars with this guy....crikey : imagine losing 2 or 3 million dollars in investment...your life savings..if I was Madoff : I would watch out....somebody will murder him in prison !.

i love the way you guys choose to distort what i write to suit your own premise ..... you must be employed by the "red tops"

Jews do not like being ****** especially by one of their own, it goes against their upbringing of ***** every one else.


Edited by MoneyAM

and the rabbit's up and running again

cynic more like a rat we all know you love to have the last word on every thread.

i've said my piece, and i'll leave you guys to rabbit on with your own "interesting" perceptions and purblind prejudices on the iniquity of the jews and similar

cynic it cerrtainly makes a change for you not to have the last word!

Maybe he has gone to the Synagogue

I have issued a warning on this thread before and I expect the code of conduct to be adhered to. Any further transgressions by anyone will result in the removal of that users access to these bulletin boards.