When the Bernie Madoff scandal first broke last December, PEOPLE Magazine tasked me with contacting victims of this catastrophic Ponzi scheme. I soon conducted interview after interview with people who lost their life savings in the blink of an eye. In many cases, the victims had never even heard of Madoff until the scandal broke, thinking their nest egg was safe in the hands of a financial planner who, unbeknownst to them, was simply funneling their money to Madoff.
In June I attended Madoff’s sentencing in Manhattan, and listened sympathetically to victims talk about how the scandal ruined their lives. Senior citizens had to return to work for the first time in years. Parents had to move in with their children. One woman with haunting eyes and a noticeable limp said that at times she was reduced to foraging through trash cans when her Social Security check had been spent.
So it was with significant happiness that I learned that 1,368 victims had gotten at least some of their money back. On Wednesday, Irving Picard, the trustee appointed to recover assets for former Madoff investors, announced that more than $534 million has been paid out to Madoff victims. Picard said his agency has so far collected about $1.4 billion in assets, so more payouts could come soon.
“We have made significant headway in recent months in processing customer claims in challenging circumstances,” Picard said on a conference call, as reported by Bloomberg. “We are handling these claims as expeditiously as possible.”
The Securities Investor Protection Corp., a sort of quasi-government agency that is liquidating Madoff’s former firm, paid the money. The initial payouts don’t even come close to recouping all the losses — which are believed to total around $21.2 billion — but it’s certainly a start.
With financial devastation this huge, any kind of progress is a victory.
Photo courtesy of owaisk_4u via stock.xchang.