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Bernard Madoff - Source: Reuters -
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Disgraced financier Bernard Madoff left his jail cell and was
taken under guard to court to hear his punishment for running Wall
Street's biggest and most brazen investment fraud.
A US judge is expected to sentence Madoff, 71, to an effective life
term in prison during a court hearing in which some of his
defrauded investors will describe the shock of losing their life
savings.
Dozens of people started lining up outside the federal courthouse
in lower Manhattan three hours before the scheduled start of the 10
am local time proceeding in a ceremonial courtroom that seats 250
people.
"I don't care what they do with him. I don't care if they turn him
loose. Just get us back our money," said Emma Devita, 81, who saved
for 20 years with Madoff and says she is now broke.
"But I want him to be as poor as we are," she said outside the
courthouse.
The confessed swindler, who pleaded guilty to a slew of crimes in
the same court in March, will speak to the shame he has felt and to
the pain he has caused, said his lawyer, Ira Lee Sorkin.
In a letter to US District Court Judge Denny Chin on Sunday,
Sorkin argued for a sentence less than the life term requested by
US prosecutors.
He disputed the size of the loss to investors, saying it does not
appear to rise to the historic proportions that the government has
maintained.
But Sorkin added that he did not seek to minimize the magnitude
of the crimes to which Mr Madoff pled guilty.
Madoff confessed to running a multibillion-dollar Ponzi scheme in
which investors were paid returns from money paid by later
investors.
Investigators do not know how much was stolen, according to court
papers.
Prosecutors say $US170 billion ($262 billion) flowed through the
principal Madoff account over decades, and that weeks before the
financier's December arrest the firm's statements showed a total of
$US65 billion ($100 billion) in accounts.
The trustee winding down the Madoff firm has so far collected
$US1.2 billion ($1.8 billion) to return to investors.
"Given the enormous amount of funds he has stolen and the number of
victims, the sentence is going to be very, very high," said Paul
Radvany, a law professor at Fordham University in New York and a
former federal prosecutor.
Family will not attend
Madoff's wife Ruth and other family members are not expected to be
in court for the sentencing.
They have not attended any of Madoff's court appearances since
his arrest.
Madoff's brother, Peter, and his sons, Mark and Andrew, held
executive positions in the brokerage unit of Madoff's firm.
Their lawyers say they were not aware of or involved in the
crooked asset management side.
The judge has allowed Madoff, a former nonexecutive chairman of the
Nasdaq stock market, to wear his own clothes at the sentencing
hearing, instead of the loose-fitting uniform issued by the jail
where he has been held since March 12.
He wore a dark business suit.
Madoff has said all along that he committed the fraud on his own.
He has not named any accomplices.
The only other person charged is his outside accountant.
Michael Shapiro, a lawyer at law firm Carter Ledyard and Milburn
LLP, said he expects a prison sentence of 30 years, based on
previous sentences for large frauds in the same court.
He cited the case of former WorldCom Chief Executive Bernard
Ebbers, who is serving 25 years for accounting fraud in a
low-security prison.
WorldCom said the fraud amounted to $US11 billion ($16
billion).
"The individual damage that Madoff caused is probably much
greater," Shapiro said.
"Thirty years is effectively a life sentence and also takes into
account he didn't kill anybody."
Madoff will serve his time in a low- or medium-security prison,
depending on the length of his incarceration.
The case is USA v Madoff 09-213 in US District Court for the
Southern District of New York (Manhattan).
