Now Reading: Richard Behar exchanged emails with Bernie Madoff for a decade
-
01
Richard Behar exchanged emails with Bernie Madoff for a decade
Richard Behar
Courtesy: Lizzie Cohen
You in all probability have not heard Bernie Madoff‘s title in awhile, however that does not imply the notorious fraudster’s story is over, or the ache he inflicted.
Irving Picard, an 83-old court-appointed trustee, nonetheless spends his days attempting to claw again cash from the those that benefitted from Madoff’s Ponzi scheme, and to scale back the staggering losses of others.
Greater than 100 authorized battles over the best identified fraud in historical past nonetheless rage on.
Richard Behar, who has simply revealed a brand new biography, “Madoff: The Closing Phrase,” can also be nonetheless attempting to grasp how Madoff’s thoughts labored. What permits an individual to tear off Elie Wiesel, who survived the Holocaust and went on to develop into a predominant chronicler of it? Or to take a seat along with his spouse, Ruth, in a theater and revel in a film whereas understanding that he is erased the life financial savings of 1000’s of individuals everywhere in the world?
These questions haunted Behar — who tells CNBC he has lengthy been fascinated by con-artists. So lengthy after most different reporters had turned their consideration elsewhere, he reached out to Madoff whereas the monetary legal served out his 150-year jail sentence in North Carolina.
Richard Behar’s guide ‘Madoff: The Closing Phrase.’
Behar began by sending his condolences to Madoff, whose son, Mark, had simply died by suicide in Dec. 2010, the second anniversary of his father’s arrest.
Shortly after, an electronic mail topic line popped up in Behar’s inbox: “Inmate: MADOFF, BERNARD L.” That message was the begin to a decade-long relationship between the 2 males, together with roughly 50 telephone conversations, a whole bunch of emails and three in-person visits. When Madoff died in April 2021, Behar was nonetheless writing the biography. Madoff usually complained to Behar that he was taking too lengthy on the guide.
“He as soon as joked that he’d be lifeless when it got here out, which in fact turned out to be true, though I by no means deliberate it that means,” Behar mentioned.
CNBC interviewed Behar, an award-winning journalist and contributing editor of investigations at Forbes, over electronic mail this month. (The dialog has been edited and condensed for fashion and readability.)
‘He by no means requested me one private query’
Annie Nova: You write that you simply’re an investigative reporter with “a particular fondness for scammers.” Why do you assume that’s?
Richard Behar: I’ve at all times been mesmerized by how the brains of scammers work. I am particularly intrigued, perhaps obsessed, with scammers who steal from people who find themselves very near them — like Madoff did.
A scamster who I visited in jail within the Nineteen Nineties did one thing comparable. Till Bernie’s arrest, this man ran the lengthiest identified Ponzi scheme ever, for 11 years. He was orphaned and raised by an aunt and uncle, and but financially devoured them, in addition to his cousins, his spouse’s mother and father, his greatest buddy — even a nun who he charmed along with his alleged religion in god. I wasn’t raised by my organic mother and father both, and spent my childhood in foster properties. I could not fake to think about doing that to individuals who stepped as much as take care of me, nevertheless it’s endlessly fascinating to me. Perhaps that is the place that fondness for scammers is rooted.
Bernard Madoff arrives at Manhattan Federal court docket on March 12, 2009 in New York Metropolis.
Stephen Chernin | Getty Pictures Information | Getty Pictures
AN: Did Madoff take any curiosity in your life?
RB: By way of an almost decade-long relationship, he by no means requested me one private query. That was mind-boggling. I might generally give him openings, like telling him I grew up in a city not removed from his hometown — with an identical however poorer Jewish subculture — however he mentioned nothing. He could not care much less. I requested a psychologist about this, and he or she theorized that Bernie was such a malignant narcissist that he could not “maintain my actuality, he might solely maintain his personal.” I could not be a three-dimensional human being to him, as a result of if he can think about that, he’d must think about the varsity trainer who has misplaced a pension.
AN: What was probably the most regret you noticed him present over what he’d executed?
RB: I as soon as requested if he might ever forgive himself for the Ponzi itself, and he mentioned “No, by no means.” He insisted he felt nice regret for individuals who he stole from. However I by no means completely felt it. By no means a tear. I requested why he did not cry at his sentencing, and he snapped: “In fact I did not cry; I used to be cried out.”
‘Jail was a terrific reduction for him’
AN: How did Madoff say life in jail modified him?
RB: He by no means talked about it. He as soon as described himself as feeling numb. I mentioned, “I can not think about what it could be like.” He replied, “You do not wish to know, you do not wish to know.”
In some methods, I believe being in jail was a terrific reduction for him. Working a half-century Ponzi has received to be exhausting. In jail, he’d usually get up in his cell at round 4 a.m., make espresso in mattress with an immediate sizzling water machine, then learn, or take heed to NPR till breakfast. He labored within the kitchen, then the laundry room after which oversaw the inmates’ pc room.
That final job cracked me up as a result of he advised me he might barely flip a pc on in his workplace, which ought to have been a purple flag to everybody on the firm that he wasn’t truly buying and selling shares.
AN: You write that he was seeing a therapist in jail. Do we all know usually this was, or for a way lengthy it lasted? Did it appear to be serving to him?
RB: He ended one telephone chat abruptly as a result of he needed to get to certainly one of his weekly appointments along with his psychologist. When he known as me afterwards, I requested the way it went. He laughed and mentioned it was useful, that she was a “terrific girl” and that he thinks he ought to have executed remedy years earlier than. However even when the periods had been useful, he mentioned he by no means discovered the solutions he sought about why he did the fraud and why he damage so many individuals.
NEW YORK – MARCH 12: Financier Bernard Madoff passes the gathered press as he arrives at Manhattan Federal court docket on March 12, 2009 in New York Metropolis. Madoff was anticipated to plead responsible to all 11 felony costs introduced by prosecutors on monetary misdoings, and will find yourself with a sentence of 150 years in jail.
Chris Hondros | Getty Pictures
He was disturbed by press experiences that known as him a sociopath. He mentioned he requested his therapist, “Am I a sociopath? A whole lot of purchasers had been family and friends — how might I do that?” Bernie claims that she advised him that folks have the power to compartmentalize, like mobsters that kill after which go house and maintain their children.
You simply put it out of your thoughts. I requested if she got here up with a analysis. He mentioned, no, only a compartmentalizer. Perhaps she advised him that to make him really feel higher since he wasn’t ever getting out.
AN: For therefore a few years, it seemed like Madoff was simply ready to be caught. Is that proper? Did he at all times know he would not be capable to get away with this? What was residing in that suspended state like for him?
RB: Bernie mentioned he was below fixed stress over the Ponzi, and would discuss out loud to himself generally within the workplace, due to the strain. One in all his greatest retailers for relieving the stress was sitting in darkish theaters along with his spouse Ruth, he mentioned, watching films twice per week. He additionally mentioned he deluded himself into pondering some “miracle” would come alongside to bail him out of the Ponzi, however that he knew for at the very least the final decade earlier than his arrest that he’d by no means get out from below it.
The one time he really relaxed, he mentioned, was on weekends when he was out on his yacht. I interviewed a former FBI behavioral evaluation professional who recommended Bernie felt secure on the boat as a result of he might see 360 levels round him, all the best way to the horizon, so he’d have quite a lot of forewarning {that a} menace was coming.
‘Not a single investor’ had complained to the SEC
AN: You paint a very attention-grabbing portrait of the determine of Irving Picard, an 83-year-old court-appointed trustee, who has spent years attempting to get a refund for Madoff’s traders. Has this been Picard’s solely job through the years? Why has he made this his life mission?
RB: Picard not often talks with the press. I used to be simply chatting with John Moscow, a former chief white-collar crimes prosecutor for the Manhattan DA’s workplace who labored on some Madoff circumstances for the trustee. He mentioned: “Irving is a really trustworthy public servant.” He is laser targeted on his job. John’s phrases had been: “He is not manic about it, however he is very shut.”
In my guide, I quote a former federal prosecutor saying that you may probe this case for 50 years and nonetheless not get to all of the truths, however Picard is not interested by that. It has been his solely chapter case since 4 days after Bernie’s arrest in 2008. He’s ferocious in the direction of internet winners who will not return funds, however he generally is a gentle teddy bear with those that haven’t got the cash for him to claw again. He might allow them to pay it over time, or he’ll take somebody’s home however depart them a life curiosity in it.
AN: What do you assume individuals get most improper about Madoff?
RB: Lots of people who misplaced cash get it improper by blaming him solely, reasonably than trying within the mirror and asking themselves how they may have put themselves in such hazard. Madoff’s constant and excessive returns had been merely not doable. Even so, many internet losers assume the federal government owes them as a result of the SEC did not seize Bernie. However that company’s mandate has by no means been to guard individuals from silly funding choices.
Financier Bernard Madoff arrives at Manhattan Federal court docket on March 12, 2009 in New York Metropolis. Madoff is scheduled to enter a responsible plea on 11 felony counts which below federal regulation can lead to a sentence of about 150 years. (Photograph by Stephen Chernin/Getty Pictures)
Stephen Chernin | Getty Pictures
I discussed to you that I went to a jail again within the ’90s to go to the man who had the longest-running Ponzi previous to Madoff’s arrest. Identical to Bernie, that swindler couldn’t have executed it with no huge financial institution’s complicity. In that case — an 11-year-long Ponzi — an investor reached out to the SEC to complain that he’d misplaced cash regardless that he’d been assured a preposterous 20-25% return. The scamster was arrested the next day.
In Bernie’s case, not a single investor over the half-century of his fraud contacted the SEC. They had been too busy splashing round within the gravy.
