Bernie Madoff

Bio:
Bernie Madoff (born Bernard Lawrence “Bernie” Madoff in Queens, NY on April 29, 1938) was a stockbroker, who ran a billion-dollar firm. He attended University of Alabama, then transferred to Hofstra University, earning a degree in political science. After saving up $5,000 from a lifeguard job, and $50,000 borrowed from his wife’s parents, they founded an investment firm, Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, LLC. They quickly had a celebrity-filled client list (Kevin Bacon, Steven Spielberg, etc.). By the end of 1989, he firm was a front-runner in the trading volume on the New York Stock exchange. In 2008, his sons went to the police reporting that everything their father had done was a lie — and that it was all a Ponzi scheme. He was arrested one day later and admitted to losing $50 billion of his investors’ money. He pleaded guilty to 11 felony counts. He was sentenced to 150 years in prison and was sent to Butner Federal Correction Complex in North Carolina.

Best Known For:
Bernie Madoff is best known as a stockbroker that ran — and was caught running — an elaborate Ponzi scheme in 2008.

Personal Life:
Bernie Madoff met Ruth in high school, and they married in 1959. He was attending Hofstra University in Long Island while she was in Queens. They had two children, Andrew and Mark. Two years after he went to prison to the day, in 2010, Mark committed suicide in his home. Then four years later, Andrew passed away from cancer. In 2014, Bernie had a heart attack in prison and was reportedly diagnosed with stage four kidney disease.