Bernard Madoff, Master Swindler and King of the Ponzi Scheme — He Had Close Ties To Top Politicians and Lots of Protection

New Book: Senator Schumer Was Regular Visitor to Madoff Offices

Senator Chuck Schumer at a Senate Hearing.

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
New York City has 8.4 million people living in its boroughs. But when it comes to defending those charged with financial crimes, it’s a very small, clubby world of people who are either related to each other or have worked together in the past. And this clubby group has one more thing in common: most of its members seem to be lavishing huge campaign contributions on U.S. Senator Charles (Chuck) Schumer of New York – a man who is in a position to recommend Federal Judge appointments and the Justice Department’s U.S. Attorney who will prosecute the financial crimes – or not.

These are the findings in a new on-line book, JPMadoff: The Unholy Alliance Between America’s Biggest Bank and America’s Biggest Crook, being offered free as a chapter a month by attorneys Helen Davis Chaitman and Lance Gotthoffer. (Chaitman is a nationally recognized litigator who was swindled by Madoff and is passionate about getting an unabridged recital of facts out to the public, including details about the extensive involvement in the fraud by the big Wall Street bank, JPMorgan Chase, and Madoff clients that the authors believe to have been co-conspirators.)

Chapter 3 is now up on the web site and delivers this nugget: “Senator Schumer was a frequent visitor to Madoff in his office in New York’s Lipstick Building.” This information came to Chaitman in 2009 from Madoff employees and is confirmed by a 2014 interview with Madoff himself by Politico’s MJ Lee, indicating that Schumer paid personal visits to Madoff to collect campaign contributions.

In the March Politico article, Lee adds this: “Approached in a Senate hallway last week, Schumer seemed willing to talk to a reporter — until the subject of Madoff came up. ‘I’m not commenting,’ the New York Democrat said as he walked away. ‘I am not commenting.’ ”

The web of relationships unveiled in the book include the following:

The U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Preet Bharara, who agreed to a deferred prosecution agreement against JPMorgan Chase for their involvement in the Madoff fraud and who allowed the family of Madoff client Jeffry Picower to keep billions of dollars that very likely grew out of the fraud, was Senator Schumer’s former Chief Counsel and recommended for the prosecutor’s post in 2009 by Senator Schumer.

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