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US agents seize Madoff home
Ed Harris02.04.09
US marshals have swooped on the $10million Florida home of Bernard Madoff and his wife as they continue to seize the assets of the disgraced Wall Street financier.
Marshals also confiscated two of the couple's boats moored at marinas near the two-storey property in Palm Beach, which was used as a winter retreat.
Nobody was at the property - set amid manicured lawns and hedges on Florida's coastal waterway - when federal agents moved in.
"We are securing the house, changing all the locks on the house. We are taking a complete inventory," said Barry Golden of the US Marshals Service.
Madoff, 70, a former Nasdaq stock market chairman, has been charged with operating the biggest investment fraud on Wall Street, cheating private investors, charities and pension funds out of an estimated $65 billion.
The Madoff assets, which were handed over to official custodians for safe-keeping, were secured under a seizure warrant issued by the US District Court for the Southern District of New York, where Madoff is in jail awaiting sentencing.
Locks were changed on more than half a dozen doors of the Palm Beach home. "It's a fully-furnished lived-in house," Mr Golden said at the property, which is tucked behind a towering hedge. The backyard pool is fringed with palms and a flowering bougainvillea.
Earlier, federal agents in Davie, near Fort Lauderdale, took control of a 55ft customised boat, called Bull, while in Palm City, West Palm Beach, they seized Little Bull, a 24ft recreational craft.
The seizures came a day after a judge froze the assets of Madoff's two sons, who worked at his firm. Assets of five executives who ran hedge fund portfolios that funnelled money into Madoff's "Ponzi" scheme also were frozen.
Bernard Madoff has confessed to perpetrating the fraud, involving more than 4,800 client accounts. It was not immediately clear what other assets belonging to Madoff or his family would be seized, as TV showed footage of agents aboard the larger boat.
"It was a 55-foot customised motor yacht in pristine condition. We took it from the marina," Mr Golden said. The boat would remain in custody and be maintained pending another order from the court, he added.
Other Madoff property listed as "subject to forfeiture" includes a 75ft sport yacht, also called Bull, docked in Juan-les-Pins, France; property in New York and Cap d'Antibes, France; cars, a Steinway piano, silverware, jewellery, bank funds, shares and securities.
His victims include several of the richest families in Palm Beach.
Reader views (1)
Excellent! but very late. Is it possible such investigations should apply to the other countries, i.e Middle East and south east asia. All assets in overseas should be seize to meet the financial crunch of the affected countries. Lot of bank accounts in Swiss Bank should be securitnised.Only 10 to 20% of the peoples of that country hold the illegal money in Banks and real estate, their assets beyound their income. Instead of getting loans and aid from World Bank, IMF, or UK, USA, utilise the dead money in the banks to cater the basic necessities of these countries and change the status of the poor peoples who are suffering to get bread, meet their both ends.
- M A Sular, London
