UPDATE: the Madoff suicides…

As indicated in my original commentary, I thought Madoff might commit suicide to escape the public shame and legal consequences of his historic scheme. It turns out, however, that one of the fund managers who unwittingly feed victims to Maddoff was the first to do so.

Specifically, Rene-Thierry Magon de la Villehuchett, 65, lost $1.4 billion of his clients’ money by investing it with Madoff to guarantee inflated returns for them and commensurate commissions for himself.  Unable to cope with clients demanding their money and with lawsuits flooding in, de la Villehuchett reportedly locked himself in his Madison Avenue office last night, where he was found dead this morning with his wrists slashed.

(Madoff suicides begin, The iPINIONS Journal, December 23, 2008, Vol. IV, p. 389)

This quote clearly indicates that I thought more than a few of those implicated in Bernie Madoff’s $50-billion-ponzi scheme would opt for suicide instead of facing what would surely be grave criminal, civil, financial and social consequences. 

And, sure enough, a couple of other suicides since then have been attributed to fears in this respect. But I suspect that others were lulled into a false sense of relief by the inordinate amount of time it has taken to investigate the labyrinthine nature of this scheme. 

Well, that all changed a few weeks ago when the trustee charged with recovering money for Madoff’s victims began filing nearly 60 lawsuits seeking more than $40 billion from dozens of banks,  hedge funds, and individuals.  The defendants are all being accused of knowing about the fraud but covering it up and profiting from it. And the most notable among them are Madoff’s two sons and even his grandchildren – for whom trust funds had been established with ill-gotten gains.

The flood of litigation came as Irving Picard hit a deadline for seeking compensation on Saturday, the second anniversary of Mr Madoff’s 2008 arrest. The lawsuits represent the product of more than 1,100 subpoenas and two years of investigation by Mr Picard’s law firm…

(The Financial Times, December 12, 2010)

More to the point, I have no doubt that it was the reality of these lawsuits, not some gallows commemoration of the second anniversary of his father’s arrest, that led Mark Madoff to commit suicide on Saturday by hanging himself with a dog leash in his New York City apartment.

Meanwhile, the FT confirmed that the U.S. attorney in Manhattan is still conducting parallel criminal investigations that could last another three years.  This means that, after civil lawsuits land those involved in this scheme in the poor house, criminal trials will land them in jail.

Accordingly, chances are that, like Mark, many more of them will find having the twin damoclean swords of poverty and imprisonment hanging over their heads too much to bear….

Related commentaries:
Madoff appeal…