150 Years in the Slammer for Madoff

Bernard Madoff, the man responsible for the biggest Ponzi scheme in human history, has been sentenced to 150 years in prison. The judge was unswayed by the “tormented state” Madoff now finds himself in after swindling $65 billion over a span of 20 years, which affected thousands of people, from Elie Wiesel and Sandy Koufax to small investors and retirees.

The New York Times:

A federal judge sentenced Bernard L. Madoff to 150 years in prison on Monday for operating a huge Ponzi scheme that devastated thousands of people, calling his crimes “extraordinarily evil.”

In pronouncing the sentence — the maximum he could have handed down — Judge Denny Chin turned aside Mr. Madoff’s own assertions of remorse and rejected the suggestion from Mr. Madoff’s lawyers that there was a sense of “mob vengeance” surrounding calls for a long prison term.

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AP photo / Louis Lanzano

Bernie Madoff arriving at Manhattan federal court in March. He’s the guy full of remorse stepping out of the Mercedes.