- This topic has 0 replies, 1 voice, and was last updated 15 years, 6 months ago by
.
-
Posts
-
-
When people like us think of crime we focus on assault, rape, robbery, home invasion and the physical violence that surrounds it. The aftermath of a physical assault is devastating and you can’t look far in this world to find someone who has not been directly affected by violence.
But today, I want to talk about white collar crime. The kind of thing like Madoff and Milken made famous. While no physical damage is incurred, I have seen first hand how these types of crimes literally tear communities and families apart.
When I was 4 years old in 1972, a cousin of m mother’s asked to borrow $48,000.00 to invest in a business and pay off some debt. He went to various members of the family and the community and asked for help. All told he collected about $200,000. A lot of which was life savings that eldery people had saved their entire lives for. To put it in perspective, a nice house back then cost around $35,000 to $50,000. You could by a mansion for $250,000. Needless to say, with the sh#t hit the fan, family members began to turn on each other and houses were divided. At the end of the day, our cousin went to Club Fed for less than a year. Recently he got pinched bilking immigrants out of their savings promising them green cards and citizenship.
Recently one of my neighbors made the news on a grander scale. we live in an affluent community. A lot of the people are self made people, bankers, athletes and performers. Others are well…criminals who make their living either skating on the edge or flat out ripping people off.
In perfect Madoff fashion, one of our community members set up a Hedge Fund. For those of you who don’t know, a Hedge Fund is a portfolio of a group of investors- usually very select and very $$$ that is managed by one of a few Financial Advisers (FA) who due to licensing laws, operate outside the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC). These FA usually are smart and know a few stocks VERY WELL. But not in the case of Madoff and my neighbor. What these guys did was take investments and funneled them through their businesses and literally deposit them into their business/personal accounts (in broad strokes).
My neighbor even set up a dummy accounting firm with a “London Office” which was actually a small accounting firm (2 people) located over a Fish & Chips. Then he falsified returns and sent statements to his clients that he was still making them money.
In October 2008 he was asked how he was doing and he said great. He purchased a $29,000,000 estate in the Hamptons and a $8,000 000 apartment in the Time Warner Building in Manhattan plus another Florida Town home with a $4,000,000 price tag and a $5,000,000 home in town.
Things went bad when the market went south and businesses needed the capital to weather the economic storm. Well ,when $5 mil and $10 mil checks start bouncing, people ask questions.
At first glance you think, hey bunch of rich people got too greedy and got what they deserved. Well, this may be so, but what you don’t see are the people who work their whole lives, build something, sell it and then plan the future of their families around it and people like this look them in the eye and convince them that they will secure that future.
How does that affect us? When people own businesses, they invest in that business. That means jobs, that means money in circulation, that means growing economy. A lot of the people invested with this guy owned everything from telecommunications to construction companies.
What kind of person sleeps well at night while living side by side with the same people he’s robbing blind. Don’t forget, this guy has a family and kids- I’m sure he’s rationalized it to the point where he did it all for his family. But, I don’t think he even cares.
What will happen to this guy, a stint in a medium security prison. You know, there has to be a point where these people are treated like the criminals they are.
-
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
