Bernie Madoff leaves federal court in New York on March 10, 2009.
Jin Lee|Bloomberg through Getty Images
The fund for victims of Bernie Madoff’s historical Ponzi plan has actually started its ninth payment, dispersing about $159 million in government-seized funds to almost 25,000 individuals worldwide, the Department of Justice stated Monday.
The statement, made 15 years after Madoff’s arrest– and more than 2 years after his death in jail– highlighted the continuing effect of Madoff’s almost $65 billion securities scams rip-off.
The collapse of the world’s biggest scams plan “devastated thousands of lives,” stated Nicole Argentieri, acting assistant chief law officer of the DOJ’s criminal department, in a news release.
With its most current circulation, the fund has actually paid over $4.2 billion to more than 40,800 victims who lost cash from the plan, the DOJ stated.
The Madoff Victim Fund has actually now assisted recuperate “over 90% of victim losses,” Argentieri stated.
The victims of Madoff’s decadeslong scams consisted of significant stars and banks. But they likewise consisted of charities and pension funds that invested cash for individuals “working paycheck-to-paycheck who were relying on their pension accounts for their retirements,” kept in mind U.S. Attorney Damian Williams.
Madoff in March 2009 confessed taking billions of dollars from his customers by running his financial investment advisory company, Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC, as a giant Ponzi plan. He pleaded guilty to 11 federal felonies and was sentenced to 150 years in jail.
The victims fund has actually gathered about $2.2 billion through a civil forfeit healing from the estate of Jeffrey Picower, the late Madoff financier and leading recipient of the plan.
An extra $1.7 billion was available in 2014 from JPMorgan Chase, the bank Madoff utilized to run his Ponzi plan, as part of a postponed prosecution contract with the DOJ.
The rest originated from “a civil forfeiture action against investor Carl Shapiro and his family, and from civil and criminal forfeiture actions against Madoff, Peter B. Madoff, and their co-conspirators,” the DOJ stated in Monday’s release.
