Madoff’s [Nantucket] island ties

The Inquirer and Mirror ^ | January 9, 2009 | Jason Graziadei

[Lorianne]

During the court proceedings in the early 1990s, Avellino was represented by attorney Ira “Ike” Sorkin, who now represents Madoff in his defense of a single count of securities fraud filed against him by the SEC. In another connection between Avellino and Madoff, Lee Richards, who was just appointed by the SEC as the receiver of all Bernard Madoff Investment Securities assets, also served as the court-appointed trustee over Avellino & Bienes during its legal dispute with the federal agency, according to Bloomberg.

The Spanish banking conglomerate Banco Santander, which will acquire Nantucket Bank through its planned purchase of parent company Sovereign Bancorp, had more than $3 billion invested with Madoff through a hedge fund, all of which is presumed lost. Santander’s involvement with Madoff, however, is not expected to affect Nantucket Bank customers in any way.

“It doesn’t impact the pending deal between Sovereign and Santander, and Sovereign has no relationship to Madoff and his firm, no direct relationship,” Sovereign spokesperson Ellen Molle said. “There could be customers who were invested with him, but not through Sovereign.”

Madoff, 70, is currently under electronic surveillance and house arrest in his Park Avenue apartment in New York City. His elaborate Ponzi scheme was hyped to investors as an exclusive opportunity to obtain consistently high returns, but Madoff was simply paying off his early investors with funds deposited by new ones. The scheme fell apart when the current credit crisis and economic slowdown led many investors to try to pull their money out. Madoff’s alleged victims range from universities and hospitals, to banks, charities and numerous wealthy investors including New York Mets owner Fred Wilpon and Madoff’s own son, according to reports.

[CriticalJ]

Madoff’s scheme will make a great book. Wonder how long before one comes out.