NEW YORK, Dec 11, 2020 (BSS/AFP) – Victims of Bernie Madoff, the mastermind
behind the worst financial scam in history, will receive $488 million in
additional payments through a victim fund, the US Justice Department said
Thursday.
The Madoff Victim Fund will disburse payments to more than 30,000 people
around the world who were cheated out of their investments by the crooked
financier between the 1970s and 2000s, the Department of Justice said in a
statement.
The operation marks the sixth time such payments have been made, bringing
the total refunds to nearly $3.2 billion, according to the department.
“That is an extraordinary level of recovery for a Ponzi scheme — but our
work is not yet finished, and the Office’s tireless commitment to
compensating the victims who suffered as a result of Madoff’s heinous crimes
continues,” acting Manhattan US Attorney General Audrey Strauss said in the
Justice Department’s statement Thursday.
The repayment funds are obliged to return $4.05 billion to victims of
Madoff, whose financial scams were exposed in late 2008.
The 82-year-old was sentenced to 150 years in prison in 2009 for running
the pyramid-style scheme, which was estimated to be worth between $25 billion
and $63 billion, depending on whether interest is included in the
calculation.
New Yorker Madoff never invested a single cent of the money the scheme’s
clients trusted him with, instead using money from new investors to pay older
ones.
He is currently serving his sentence in a federal medical prison in North
Carolina. He requested to be released earlier this year but in June his
petition was denied by the same judge who sentenced him more than a decade
ago.
These victim restitution funds are separate from the payments made by
Irving Picard, the lawyer who recovered and returned billions of dollars in
victim investments.