Bernie Stashed His Cash Offshore
My, this just gets better and better, doesn't it?
Investigators believe that Bernard Madoff has stuffed hundreds of millions of dollars in Ponzi profits into offshore tax havens from which they could prove tricky to recover.
In the weeks since his Dec. 11 arrest, forensic accountants have been scouring Madoff's books as federal officials ready an indictment against the hated hedge-funder, who remains under house arrest in his $7 million Upper East Side penthouse.
The accountants believe Madoff regularly sent bundles of money to offshore accounts in the Caribbean and Europe, the Observer newspaper in London reported yesterday.
[...] The tax havens are designed under local laws to be nearly impervious to subpoenas or other investigative inquiries, making it notoriously tough for US officials to seize or even see what's there.
I hate this shit...
Why do people gotta be so fucking crooked and evil all the time?
We have someone who actually should be waterboarded.
Only after the entire Bush administration has been wareboarded...
Well played.
wow
torture? you like torture? you want to torture people?
join the RNC!!
Lighten up Francis.
if you touch my stuff...i'll kill ya
good one!
that's where the money is. Honest people don't MAKE millions or even billions a year.
Because "greed is good," it's the American way?? Your leaders and preachers keep saying it over and over. God wants you to be rich. That's some fucking finessing.
"If the US government enforced its banking laws like it did its park regulations, we wouldn't be
in this damn park in the first place." OCCUPY.!!
I would like to see this Madoff SOB strung up to the nearest tree but let's not assume he's the only such SOB out there. His scheme just happens to be the one that fell over of it's own weight and is therefore in the spotlight right now.
There are a whole lot of big names... and not just individuals either but major companies... out there doing the same thing on varying scales and not a damned one of them is worth any more to Humanity than Madoff is.
The free market at work; your money is set free, from you, sort of like shooting at caged birds for this cabal.
So what happens to the money? Does it just sit in those banks forever?
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
If noone claims it, it eventually ends up on the banks income sheet, I think.
I mean, they have to earn some for keeping their mouths shut.
I was just going too ask the same. Can they at least name the banks?
Amended: Oh, OK, here is one anyways... "There are accounts at New York Mellon Bank
Updated: Remember Rachel's story?
The Rachel Maddow Bank Holding Company Wants Federal Help
By Nicole Belle Tuesday Dec 23, 2008 4:00pm / http://crooksandliars.com/node?page=4
Follow the $$$ trail...
Sat, 12/27/2008 - 20:54 — Truth_Critic / http://crooksandliars.com/john-amato/rip-chic...
Study the symptoms not the virus...
I'd suspected as much since the story first broke. I mean that IS how these criminals operate.
That's basically what Dick Cheney did. Now that the U.S. economy has been sucked dry of all its value and the country is steeped in war debt, all his money is in Halliburton stock (what, now a Dubai-based company, isn't it?) and foreign currency.
Why the U.S. press isn't crying bloody murder over this, too, I'll never understand. If it's a story, then it's a story.
And I might be incorrect in thinking this, but the press (at least the MSM) has probably gotten a nice chunk of cash from this whole scheme. I think the only place you will hear any real reporting is from independent media outlets.
I think we'll see a lot of wealthy people in the US immigrate to the U.A.E.
Yes, I think you're right. (Didn't Michael Jackson do so already? Or was that Saudi Arabia? Different circumstances, I realize.)
; )
he doesn't sound insane to me.
He's insane because he admitted that he did it.
n/t
of this in Europe was a couple years ago I think. An employee in a bank in Liechtenstein (as I recall) sold a CD with loads of information to the german tax authorities, for the neat price of EUR 5 million. (USD 7- 7,5 mill or so)
They couldn't use it directly as evidence, but they could use it as basis to open investigations, the boss of the german postal company resigned as part of this.
The german finance minister actually went out in the media and said that the EUR 5 mill was "Money well spent" after merely a couple days reviewing the data.
...an untimely death for him with purgatory being in the south of France or some warm place.
Sorta like a certain Enron CEO who conveniently "took his leave"?
I didn't see the body. He ain't dead.
I just came from posting the same thing on another thread. Glad to see I'm not the only one who thinks that old bastard is alive and well in some Nazi stronghold somewhere... like Paraguay.
?
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
Why is this prick under house arrest? Why isn't he in some holding cell?
He might have an urge to go visit "his" money.
For that kind of money he gets home arrest status while I read stories of people getting life for stealing a slice of pizza? If Bernie were a drugdealer, mobster, rapist, or child molester that had ruined so many lives, do you think that he would have gotten house arrest? Why is it that if you just steal money people think that you are not a danger and need to be locked up until trial?
Most of these people who are pillaging our country have off-shore accounts. I would have been more surprised he hadn't had one.
The Rethugs love little wars to liberate people. How about we invade a few countries with these off shore accounts? I bet it would be easier than Iraq :-)
that allows this sort of shit. Not to excuse his actions, but where WOULD he stash it--WAMU??
This is really a no-brainer.
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
..we'd have to say, "the laws the complicit crooks in Congress and the White House passed and signed."
"Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of Stupidity" - Frank Leahy
'Local Laws' designed to stash cash overseas...
No regulatory agencies to police it...
No media coverage to report about it...
May not even be 'illegal', as the system was designed just for this..
So a few select wingnuts can funnel billions overseas...
Think I'm crazy? I would bet money there are countess other
paper trails just like this...and not only in the private sector...
Why in the hell is this guy living under HOUSE ARREST and not in a FEDERAL "RAPE HIM IN THE ASS" PRISON???!!!!!! WHY is this accepted as OK by any of us? He is still living in the luxury he stole from others! That would be like stealing a car and being allowed to use the stolen car to get back and forth to court while your trial for auto theft was going on.... We should be screaming about this and demanding the resignation of whoever let him stay at home instead of SENDING HIM TO PRISON WITHOUT BAIL.
Steal a lot, they make you King."
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
until he gives all those $$$$'s to the US Treasury to help with Obama's economic stimulation plans. Then work release him to a job as assistant night manager at McDonald's in East St. Louis. Sounds fair enough to me.
Generally speaking I don't trust anyone making over 150K a year.
No, no, no - he gets to clean the bathrooms, empty the fryer, shovel the sidewalk, etc.
..."Oy! he was such a mensch..."
Bernie Madoff was/is a soulless crook who happened to be Jewish and saw as his main chance the knowledge to prey upon the (exaggerated?) sympathies of Jews. It's a syndrome; it's got a name..."Affinity" Syndrome? Something like that. He's a clever crook who got an edge and used it. Like Woody Guthrie said: Some folk'll rob ya with a pistol, some with a fountain pen...
...bring out the barbarian in me. I'm absolutely against the death penalty and believe the "cruel and unusual punishment" prohibition in the Constitution is a vital part of our (i.e., all human beings') rights.
Then, along comes a scumbag like Madoff and suddenly "justice" looks somewhat different. When they get finished with this guy, it shouldn't be that difficult to have him serve his sentences consecutively (in other words several lifetimes in prison). Since he's 70 years old almost any conviction ought to earn him a "life" sentence as long as he isn't eligible for parole.
Next, they need to find a prison where the only way he can be safe is to be in solitary confinement. Finally, he hardly seems to deserve visitation.
At that point, it wouldn't matter how many millions or billions of dollars he has stashed away. He'd never enjoy or even be aware of anyone enjoying a single penny of his ill-gotten fortune. If he'd like to assist authorities in recovering every penny of it, then different arrangements could be discussed.
"Next, they need to find a prison where the only way he can be safe is to be in solitary confinement. Finally, he hardly seems to deserve visitation.
At that point, it wouldn't matter how many millions or billions of dollars he has stashed away. He'd never enjoy or even be aware of anyone enjoying a single penny of his ill-gotten fortune."
He's enjoying his beautiful home as we speak while his victims are killing themselves because their life savings are gone. We need to send this asshole into PRISON were he belongs. NOW! Stealing 50 Billion and getting house arrest only flies if no one freaks out about it and DEMANDS he be held accountable like the rest of us!
...this is why it matters if Cheney/Bush et al are not prosecuted for their crimes. But, the ruling class makes the laws and decides who gets punished under them. It ain't gonna' be them.....
"Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of Stupidity" - Frank Leahy
isn't he one of the nobility in this country? Since when has the nobility ever been held accountable for anything it did to the serfs and vassals who only exist as chattel anyway?
binations for the off-shore accounts?
I think, when it stared to cave, Bernie, already an old man, decided to take the fall to shield his sons. His sons were--HAD TO BE--in it. It was THE family business. So they all worked it out that the sons would turn him in, get a pass, and Bernie'd lose his reputation, but keep the $50 BILLION...
Nice work...
n/t
Why not embargo countries with such bank laws? Do any of us really think that the money in the banks of the Caymen Islands is NOT from criminal actions? If we can go after the Al-Qeda money in banks around the world, why cant we go after the money of people that have destroyed more live than Al-Qeda ever has. Is the quick death of a terrorist in a hijacked plane any different than the slow death of poverty that these people have foisted on the American people by using accountents and forged balance sheets?
I'll volunteer to go to the Caymen Islands and look for his money in the banks there. Having been to the Caymens a couple of times, I'll "suffer" one more visit to those beautiful beaches and great restaurants all in the name of being of service to my country.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
Why are all the countries that have the lax banking laws in the nicest places, I know that they like to go there, but if you are in a poor 3rd world contry that wanted to bring in some cash why not start a bank with lax banking laws. Think of what we could have, the 1st federated bank of Moldova no waitng at the drive up windows, no cars, no line. Union bank of Somilia, where your money will be held for ransom, er, I mean in a high intrest account. Peoples bank of North Korea, where with every new dear leader account that you open up, you get a new howitzer. This could work for this poor countries.
Yeah, the guy took advantage of bad banking laws our government has been happy to overlook. And, yeah, he probably is a crook, and a not nice person. And yeah, I do hope our justice system isn't so broken or corrupt that he gets a free pass on this, and that restitution for those who have been cheated is possible.
But to wish anyone to be thrown in jail without bail where he can be raped in the ass, or waterboarded, or executed, or placed permanently in solitary confinement without visitation rights makes me very uneasy. That sort of inhumanity - toward anyone - is not something with which I want to be associated. Sorry, I just can't climb aboard this lynch mob bandwagon.
--black, brown, red, or white, but poor--busted for smack, or for boosting a car.
If that's good enough for a petty crook, it's good enough for the big boosters...even though, if he ever does do jail time, it'll be in a club fed, like the one Milliken or Boesky suffered through...
It shouldn't be his fate if he were a petty crook, black, brown, red, or white, but poor and busted for smack, or for boosting a car. It shouldn't be anyone's fate in America. And the mentality that says it's okay to do it to rich old guys like Bernie because it happens to young, poor black guys whose names we rarely even hear is what got us into waterboarding and torturing people we don't like in the first place.
It's wrong. It's wrong for petty car thieves, it's wrong for rich old embezzlers, it's wrong for suspected terrorists, it's wrong. If you're a human being - and like it or not, Bernie still qualifies as that - it's wrong.
I'd rather concentrate my ire on the governmental greed and incompetence that created the opportunity for this mess to occur in the first place, not rail on about extracting a pound of flesh from old Jewish moneymongers.
Bernie will appreciate your indifference to the plight of his victims. We dont live in your fantasy world and I for one would like to see equal justice for once.
Again, a disconnection of logic. Because I don't want to waterboard or throw someone as despicable as Bernie into solitary confinement forever makes me 'indifferent' to the plight of his victims?
I don't happen to live in my 'fantasy world' either, alas. But I would hope to hang on to that vestige of my humanity and ethics that work for a more equitable and just world. Where does your world see it possible if we visit the same inhumane and morally reprehensible actions on people we don't like?
Ah, the old put words in my mouth I never said trick. I never said waterboard him. Maybe others did, but I did not. I simply think he should not be allowed to live in luxury he stole from others while he uses money to defend himself that he stole from others. He should be in prison, not at home because he has truck loads of money HE STOLE FROM HIS VICTIMS.
Shylock was an userer, but nowhere is it alleged he was anything but honest.
Bernie's just a crook. I agree w/you that the treatment of prisoners in the USofA is abhorrent, uncivilized, and barbaric. It is made even more so by the covert 'political' nature of much of the behavior being punished therein, thereby.
But as long as one dude/brother/homie is gonna get that end of the shaft, let's don't spare it for the more genteel crooks. Where's the deterrent power in that?
"But to wish anyone to be thrown in jail without bail where he can be raped in the ass, or waterboarded, or executed, or placed permanently in solitary confinement without visitation rights makes me very uneasy."
Gosh, I wouldn't want you to be uneasy.
Every black kid that steals a IPod sits in prison until trial when they cant make bail. Where do you think the money for Bernie's bail would come from? FROM HIS VICTIMS. Get you priorities straight for pete's sake!
My priorities I think are right. The black kid who steals a iPod sitting in prison until trial because he can't make bail is a travesty of justice. One travesty of justice does not excuse condoning another.
I think you might want to reconsider your priorities - again, it's this mindset that made it possible for certain powerful officials of the United States to approve torture and think it was justifiable.
Like I said above- This is the real world. He is living in a MANSION RIGHT NOW and people have KILLED THEMSELVES because he stole everything they had. From where I sit your priorities are WAY off the mark.
Enjoy your revenge fantasies, if it makes you feel better. I prefer to hold onto an ethic that says just because someone else behaves like an asshole doesn't mean that I have to.
Again, I hope our justice system isn't so useless that poor kids who steal iPods will continue to be gangraped in prison, or that rich embezzlers can flaut the law and walk away scotfree. That would be enough for me.
But until we replace it with a better one it IS the justice system we have. Argue about tomorrow all you want but we live with what we have today.
From that viewpoint, the point becomes that Madoff is receiving preferential treatment that would not be afforded to perpetrators of far lesser crimes and the opinions that he should not BE receiving that preferential treatment are valid.
We don't go to war/court with the army/justice system we would like to have...
Bernie should not be getting preferential treatment, that's not the argument. But neither should he be subjected to waterboarding, solitary confinement without visitation rights, torture, summary execution or being gangraped in prison as some overly enthusiastic posters here have suggested as merited.
No one should. That's not a matter of 'preferential treatment'. It's a matter of common human decency.
..."that's not the argument."
Thats the arguement you're having with yourself. The agruement you keep making is based on your own utopian fantasy of a world that doesn't exist. In the real world I live in he should be in PRISON, not at home on his sofa.
About 2.5 Million people are in prison in the US right now and all of them have to deal with the possibility of rape, assault, sub standard living conditions, ect.... But not Bernie... He's special because he's rich.
Instead of seeing that as a travesty of justice, you argue the tired old assertion that no one should be treated like they are in prison. Well, bravo... What a great point, Captain obvious! But in this case we have a guy that actually DESERVES to get a KARMATIC ASS POUNDING and I for one would reserve my "common human decency" for the huge precentage of inmates that are low level drug offenders and the like that never got the breaks that Bernard Madoff is enjoying.
I gotta agree with syborg. The man should definitly be in PRISON! What happens to him there is the provence of the department of corrections NOT our decision. To say that he shouldn't be in a prison cell right the fuck now is to say that prison for poor criminals and mansions for rich criminals is an acceptable system. IT IS NOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!
A bit different level here but about a year ago I was stopped for doing 2 miles an hour over the speed limit here in our little village. I drive a beat up old car because I work for a living. Everyday I see brand new cars drive through this village doing at least 15 miles over the limit. I'm sick and tired of this 2 tiered system of justice that is America today. Maybe if I moved to New Zealand like Noony Mouse I could pretend it didn't exist too.
He snarled and glared and seemed to shove people around, like he was used to, and enjoyed, doing it.
Bernie's inner gunsel is showing...
Karma? His giant home in Palm Beach was recently broken into by robbers. I haven't heard exactly what they took.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
.
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
in the house was and took only the very best styff, i'm sure. You say somehow they knew the exact location of the safe and had the combination? Well, you could knock me over with a feather, now...!
There wasn't any sign of forced entry. Of course a home like that wouldn't have a security system either. Hmmmm!
Rumors the money may be in Israel?
Bernie absconds after his billions to Israel, and gets taken out--the sole victim--of an accidental, pre-mature car-bomb blast on the very day, within minutes of when he lands to retrieve his swag...
..it's their fault
A caveman awakens.
"If the US government enforced its banking laws like it did its park regulations, we wouldn't be
in this damn park in the first place." OCCUPY.!!
Did anyone notice, in WWII, not even the Nazis invaded Switzerland. Not because they were obeying world treaties, but because the crooks filling every government, and every aristocracy, have their loot stashed there.
While wars rage all around, that much they can agree on.
"If the US government enforced its banking laws like it did its park regulations, we wouldn't be
in this damn park in the first place." OCCUPY.!!
...bothsides of the conflict.
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
... certain of the aristocracy in this country.
Dealers in Death
The tax havens are designed under local laws to be nearly impervious to subpoenas or other investigative inquiries, making it notoriously tough for US officials to seize or even see what's there.
Send the Marines!
Might be, he's crazy like a fox...........
Reality has a liberal bias
Why this is shocking...absolutely SHOCKING!!!
Here we have a man who bilked (some of the smartest and financially informed) people out of 50 billion dollars...and they think he may have even...STASHED MONEY IN OFFSHORE ACCOUNTS??
GOSH...this guy REALLY is smart.
DUH.
How is this jerk not sitting in Riker's Island? Because of his wealth and connections? If this does not show our criminal justice system needs reform, nothing will.
Madoff is just many of the hoaxes that have been done, as we will see more in the future. We're to remember the hardship of the Holocaust as we're robbed. Israel has some of the most corrupt people yet their the children of God. Now Madoff is claiming insanity as he wisely hide the money he stole. Look for others who have done the same to claim insanity too. Madoff will get away with what he's done and so will Robert Toussie. Money can buy you anything in America ask Speaker Pelosi. She was asked with the mass murders israel is doing to wipe Palestine people off the face of the earth, Pelosi said the US will back Israel with anything ever murder. Everyone is follow the Bush Policy of illegal invasions and killing millions of innocent people to take the land. Watch out Egypt, Iraq and Syria your next. With Israel cells here in the US who knows one morning you could wake up and Israel would have taken over the United States of America.
He's just going to use the money to bail out some fuck-up.
Hey, if we can bomb Iraq for no reason, why not the Cayman Islands or Switzerland? Let's see how quick they can pony up the stolen loot-
If we can find Al Qaida's money transfers. We can certainly find Bernie's accounts.
And, there is always Water Boarding. After all, Water boarding isn't torture. Just ask the vice President.
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