Kevin Bacon, Sandy Koufax among those taken to the cleaners by Madoff

[marmar]

AP via Yahoo!:



Actors, baseball legends on Madoff client list
Celebrities, baseball legends, relatives named as Bernard Madoff clients on list of thousands

Larry Neumeister, Associated Press Writer
Thursday February 5, 2009, 9:48 am EST


NEW YORK (AP) -- Hall of Fame pitcher Sandy Koufax. Actor Kevin Bacon. World Trade Center developer Larry Silverstein. All three have at least one thing in common: Their names appear on a list of several thousand clients who lost money investing with Bernard Madoff. The list has been made public in a court filing in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan.

The list emerged late Wednesday, shortly after a whistleblower in the case, Harry Markopolos, told House lawmakers at a hearing that he had discovered that additional funds had relayed investments to Madoff in Europe -- and that the managers of these "feeder" funds may have ignored signs of the massive fraud scheme.

He plans to present his findings to the Securities and Exchange Commission's inspector general Thursday. If proven, they would substantiate the assertions of many analysts that the alleged fraud was far too large for Madoff to have conducted alone.

House lawmakers on Wednesday also sparred with SEC officials, accusing them of impeding their probe into how the agency failed to uncover the alleged fraud. ........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/NY-court-document-reveals-apf-14260542.html

[Morning Dew]

1. I see a new Kevin Bacon game on the horizon. nm

[depakid]

4. Ain't that the truth

[tridim]

2. Why are all of Madoff's clients jews?

It's pretty troubling IMO. Not because they're jewish, but because Madoff seemed to target jews with his scam. Something stinks here.

[marmar]

5. Perhaps because Madoff, who is himself Jewish, was well-known and established.....

..... in the larger Jewish community, there was a level of comfort and trust with him. It turned out not to be the case, but he was a good actor, it seems.

[tridim]

9. Yes, I know he's jewish

But that doesn't explain why he stole 99% of his money from jews. Did he turn away potential clients who weren't jewish? If so, why?

Do aetheist fund managers only serve non-religious clients?

[aquart]

14. He was connected in the Jewish community.

They say people have many words for the things that have importance in their lives, like the eskimos have 27 words for snow, describing every possible variation of snow. We Jews, however, have an almost infinite number of words to describe a worthless or rotten man: schmuck, putz, schmigeggi, schlemozl, schnurrer, momzer, schlemiel....

There are always, in any group, people happily willing to take advantage of their own.

[aquart]

7. Not all of them. But most of them.

He's connected in the Jewish community. He was trusted. Kevin Bacon is Jewish?

[onehandle]

8. Yes. nt

[joeunderdog]

12. His name is bacon. I'm doubting it.

Markopolos essentially said Madoff is just a con man who preyed on the trust of others. The fact that he used his heritage to gain trust is merely a tool of the trade of a con man.

[Starbucks Anarchist]

10. It's one form of "affinity fraud."

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122956340954216799.html

[YOY]

3. Kevin needs to get all footloose on Bernies ass.

Everybody get, everybody get,
Everybody get, everybody get,
Everybody get, everybody get FOOTLOOSE!

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

6. Six degrees of separation

from his money.

I assume Kevin is still doing ok. Unlike some charities that got burned.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

11. I really don't know how to feel about this issue.

I mean, if you're going to invest huge amounts of money into something, you should do your research carefully.

And apparently people were blowing whistles on Madoff for years, and people continued to invest their money.

That makes me think people thought they were in on the scam.

[spanone]

13. the guy who testified yesterday said it took him about five minutes to figure out it was a scam

nothing like a fool and his money

[earth mom]

15. Where's the actual list of names?

:shrug: