Bernie Goes to Jail: It’s About Bloody Time!
March 12th, 2009 by 
Celeste Fremon
When I’ve seen family men lose their jobs and all of their savings when they are unable to bail themselves out of jail while they await trial for a charge of selling $40 worth of cocaine, because a judge refuses to bring their bail amount down to a reachable level, it is just a tad vexing to hear Bernie Madoff’s attorney argue—as he did this morning— that his client should remain out on bond because, after all, Bernie’s wife paid for the security at Madoff’s $7 million penthouse. (The penthouse and nearly 3/4 of a billion $ are conveniently being held in his wife’s name. Handy, that.)
(That would be the same wife who, in a case of remarkable prescience, withdrew $17 million from one of her accounts just days before her husband’s arrest.)
Thankfully, this time, the judge didn’t listen.
After arguments began on whether Madoff should remain free on bail, his lawyer Ira Sorkin described the bail conditions and how Madoff had, “at his wife’s own expense,” paid for private security at his penthouse.
Loud laughter erupted among some of the more than 100 spectators crammed into the large courtroom on the 24th floor of the federal courthouse in lower Manhattan. The judge warned the spectators to remain silent.George Nierenberg, the first of the three investors to speak, approached the podium glaring at Madoff, then said in the financier’s direction: “I don’t know if you had a chance to turn around and look at the victims.
By the way, since it appears that Madoff will do some serious prison time, I would hope that no judge is foolish enough to send the man to any kind of Club Fed, as they used to call the Elgin Federal Prison Camp in Florida. (You can see Forbe’s Magazine’s recommendations as to the “Best Prisons,” for the well-heeled criminal.) Sing-Sing prison is nearby in Ossining, New York, and would do nicely.
UPDATE: Commenter Randy Paul points out that Sing-Sing is a State prison, but that Bernie will be perp-walked to a Federal facility. Quite right. Okay, then I nominate USP Florence ADMAX in Colorado. While it’s name isn’t as historic and colorful as Sing-Sing or Folsom, it would be just the ticket.
Here’s a profile of the place, and some of its higher profile inmates.
(Geeze. I’m getting vengeful these days. But I get too many collect calls from too many guys serving years in Level 4 prisons for nonviolent offenses that didn’t cause one-10,000th of the harm this guy caused.)
Posted in Economy, crime and punishment | 
15 Comments »
March 12th, 2009 at 11:24 am
SinSing is a state prison, so he won’t be going there. Danbury is a good possibility.
March 12th, 2009 at 11:31 am
Yeah, I know. (sigh.) More’s the pity. I just couldn’t help but think that “Sing-Sing” had a nice ring to it.
March 12th, 2009 at 12:36 pm
http://gamesareevil.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/monopoly-go-to-jail-card.jpg
March 12th, 2009 at 1:42 pm
“that didn’t cause one-10,000th of the harm this guy caused.”
Although they’re generally offenses by armed robbers and not categorically “nonviolent”, I’m of the opinion that it’s disgraceful in these times for a single person who pulled off a bank job to the tune of some hundreds or thousands of dollars to sit in prison while the folks who engineered the scams that caused the financial meltdown are still wandering around sipping their Starbucks and collecting bonuses.
March 12th, 2009 at 2:14 pm
I think we’ve gotten to the point that much of America might consider swapping out the armed bank robber guys for the former heads of Citygroup and Merrill—We Are Masters of the Universe—Lynch.
March 12th, 2009 at 4:06 pm
Super MAX prisons like ADMAX, where solitary confinement is the norm are a direct result of the elimination of capital punishment as a determent.
Now a prisoner who already has several life sentences has nothing to loose by killing a guard or another prisoner.
Sounds like a great place for Madoff.
March 12th, 2009 at 6:38 pm
If only Madoff had gotten into poetry before he went bad.
Madoff could end up at the Club Fed prison camp at Maxwell AFB in Montgomery, unless the length of his term exceeds twenty-five years. Maybe he’ll end up at the Atlanta Pen! I know a CPA/Attorney (Fred Tokars) there who had his wife murdered. I never did like him, and that violated the ethics code.
March 12th, 2009 at 8:19 pm
I’ll have to agree with Woody on this one, Madoff is why we need more poetry programs. If Madoff had the oppurtunity to attend summer camp or poetry readings he would not have comitted any crimes. Madoff is going to be another victim of our draconian prison system, Madoff is also another example of our society failing it’s best young minds.
I hope Obama will pardon Madoff and Madoff’s skills in managing our national debt. It is a real disgrace that our country would jail a non-violent peaceful person, free Madoff now !!!!
Let’s write to President Obama and not continue with the draconian ways of Bush & Cheney !!!!
Free Madoff now !!!!
Free Madoff now !!!!
Si Se Puede now !!!!
Free Madoff now !!!!
Free Madoff now !!!!
Si Se Puede now !!!!
March 12th, 2009 at 9:15 pm
LP, I think you’re quite right. Had Bernie M. been exposed to the right poetry—all would have been different. But that begs the question….WHICH POETRY?
I challenge you to come up with ta poem or two that Bernie should have read to have avoided all this heartache.
I’m happy to star the ball rolling with:
Rimbaud’s A Season in Hell
http://www.poets.org/m/dsp_poem.php?prmMID=19836
And then, randomly, O Me! O Life! by Walt Whitman.
http://www.poets.org/m/dsp_poem.php?prmMID=20247
Over to you.
I’m sure there’s better. But those are my first two pitches.
March 12th, 2009 at 10:33 pm
Here is a classic children’s story about greed and it’s adverse effects on a young man’s life. Madoff and others should learn from Slick Rick.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRC4ziQpb5I
March 13th, 2009 at 7:28 am
Now, it’s too late for Madoff to have his tattoos removed to get honest work.
March 13th, 2009 at 8:18 am
How Madoff would be punished in other nations rather than forced to survive in our prisons….
Saudi Arabia – “For stealing in Saudi Arabia they cut your hands off.”
China – “In the U.S. you get the death penalty only for murder; in China you can get the death penalty for stealing money … or doing anything considered a threat to the state.”
Russia – “…political problems also beset the Russian legal system, Madoff’s sentence would be a stark one if he fell out of favor with the ruling majority. ‘They tend to send the most important prisoners to Siberia, to the far east in Russia, to prisons that are pretty awful.’”
In Japan – “Sometimes in cases like this where there’s a strong sense of a personal failure and betraying the group and the group’s welfare, someone might commit suicide, having dishonored himself.”
In progressive areas of California:
“Biker #1: I say, we kill him.
Biker Gang: YEAH!
Biker #2: I say we hang him, then we kill him.
Biker Gang: YEAH!
Biker #3: I say we stab him, then we hang him, then we kill him!
Biker Gang: YEAH!
Biker #4: I say we grab him…
Biker gang: Yeah?
Biker #4: Then we beat him, then we kick him, then we tattoo him, then we shoot him, then we stab him, and THEN we kill him!
Biker Gang: Yeah!
Biker Babe: And I say…you let ME have him first!!
Biker Gang: OH YEAH!!”
March 13th, 2009 at 9:17 am
LP….I like Slick Rick. Okay, poetry AND cautionary children’s stories. That works.
October 25th, 2009 at 2:28 pm
Are you a fucking dumbass, “lost Poetry”? How the fuck would Bernie fucking Madoff be different if he read poetry? You are the kind of person that is ruining the world. Your probably some gay ass fuck
October 25th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
It was a joke aimed at me because I have co-directed a poetry program for former gang members.
And please find a way to comment without using “fuck” every fourth word.
Thank you.