The Madoff Chronicles: Inside the Secret World of Bernie and Ruth by Brian Ross Page A
Authors: Brian Ross
Tags: General, Biography & Autobiography, Swindlers and Swindling, Business, Criminals & Outlaws, Ponzi Schemes, Commercial Crimes, Capitalists and Financiers
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Ruth kept a very close eye on Bernie after that. As he served as a chauffeur one day, he heard Bernie ask Ruth, “So, honey, when you coming back?”
“She goes, ‘You think I’m gonna tell you when I’m coming back?’
“I wanted to turn around, tell him, ‘She knows your ass real good,’” Little Rick said.
Madoff also had a loyal team of attractive female masseuses. His “little black book,” a $415 goatskin version from the French leather goods store Hermès, contained nine women, under M, who provided massages, in New York, Montauk, Florida, and France.
“I did tell Bernie if he loses that book that somebody’s gonna think he’s a pervert,” said Eleanor, who kept a separate copy of the address book and provided it to the FBI.
In the book, the Madoff number for “Lena” traces to a sexually explicit Web site, where “Lena” is also called “Lilly.” On the site, customers say they paid $150 for a “nude” massage. “The massage was very good and she used her tits and hair to add to the sensual feel. I loved it,” wrote one satisfied client.
Other female masseuses have Web sites that state they are “non-sexual.” Bernie’s former messenger, Little Rick, said Madoff told him he often liked to watch “one woman massage another.”
The stories of Madoff with other escort service women, hotel masseuses, and certain attractive female employees were well known around the office. According to former employees, this was especially true in the 1980s. Ruth learned to live with it.
She could find her consolation in her status as Mrs. Madoff, the wife of one of Wall Street’s most successful investment strategists. Their presence was sought after by hostesses in Manhattan, the Hamptons, and Palm Beach. Her corporate platinum Amex card allowed her to buy whatever she wanted, whenever she wanted. In January 2008, company documents show that Ruth spent $3,792 on a one-day Paris stroll from Giorgio Armani to Jil Sander to Marni.
And she made sure to send word back to the old neighborhood about just how wealthy she and Bernie were getting.
Bernie’s childhood friend Jay Portnoy says his mother received regular updates from Ruth’s mother, Sara Alpern, and Bernie’s mother, Sylvia. “I was often told, ‘Mrs. Alpern says Bernie’s doing very well in the stock market,’ ‘Mrs. Madoff says Bernie’s now doing extremely well,’ ‘Mrs. Alpern says Bernie’s now a millionaire,’ and then a multimillionaire.”
By 2006, at the age of sixty-eight, Madoff had enough money and free time to enjoy a fourth home, this time on the French Riviera. The Chase Bank corporate account had several billion dollars in it, enough to handle the continued 12- to 20-percent returns and the occasional client withdrawal. Under Frank and Annette’s supervision, the seventeenth floor was operating like a well-oiled machine. Madoff could take time away from the office without fear of the scheme collapsing. He and Ruth loved France—especially the Riviera.
Bernie and Ruth had traveled there often, staying at the Hôtel du Cap Eden Roc in Cap d’Antibes, between Cannes and Nice. It is one of the most elegant hotels in the world, built on a cliff overlooking the Mediterranean and surrounded by a forest of pines. The yachts line up along the waterfront so that their owners can be ferried to the hotel’s outdoor terrace for lunch next to the pool. It was Bernie Madoff’s kind of place.
The Madoff villa was nearby, in an area of Cap d’Antibes known as Château des Pins.
Ruth and Bernie spent a lot of time and money collecting antiques and art for their French villa: a $35,000 painting bought at the Armory Show in New York, furniture from hidden Parisian shops, a leather chair from London. The villa was modest by the standards of many of the Riviera’s grand estates, but the Madoffs loved it.
“Nothing flashy at all,” said Nando Pignatelli, the former stock broker who often visited at the Madoffs’ place.
“She goes, ‘You think I’m gonna tell you when I’m coming back?’
“I wanted to turn around, tell him, ‘She knows your ass real good,’” Little Rick said.
Madoff also had a loyal team of attractive female masseuses. His “little black book,” a $415 goatskin version from the French leather goods store Hermès, contained nine women, under M, who provided massages, in New York, Montauk, Florida, and France.
“I did tell Bernie if he loses that book that somebody’s gonna think he’s a pervert,” said Eleanor, who kept a separate copy of the address book and provided it to the FBI.
In the book, the Madoff number for “Lena” traces to a sexually explicit Web site, where “Lena” is also called “Lilly.” On the site, customers say they paid $150 for a “nude” massage. “The massage was very good and she used her tits and hair to add to the sensual feel. I loved it,” wrote one satisfied client.
Other female masseuses have Web sites that state they are “non-sexual.” Bernie’s former messenger, Little Rick, said Madoff told him he often liked to watch “one woman massage another.”
The stories of Madoff with other escort service women, hotel masseuses, and certain attractive female employees were well known around the office. According to former employees, this was especially true in the 1980s. Ruth learned to live with it.
She could find her consolation in her status as Mrs. Madoff, the wife of one of Wall Street’s most successful investment strategists. Their presence was sought after by hostesses in Manhattan, the Hamptons, and Palm Beach. Her corporate platinum Amex card allowed her to buy whatever she wanted, whenever she wanted. In January 2008, company documents show that Ruth spent $3,792 on a one-day Paris stroll from Giorgio Armani to Jil Sander to Marni.
And she made sure to send word back to the old neighborhood about just how wealthy she and Bernie were getting.
Bernie’s childhood friend Jay Portnoy says his mother received regular updates from Ruth’s mother, Sara Alpern, and Bernie’s mother, Sylvia. “I was often told, ‘Mrs. Alpern says Bernie’s doing very well in the stock market,’ ‘Mrs. Madoff says Bernie’s now doing extremely well,’ ‘Mrs. Alpern says Bernie’s now a millionaire,’ and then a multimillionaire.”
By 2006, at the age of sixty-eight, Madoff had enough money and free time to enjoy a fourth home, this time on the French Riviera. The Chase Bank corporate account had several billion dollars in it, enough to handle the continued 12- to 20-percent returns and the occasional client withdrawal. Under Frank and Annette’s supervision, the seventeenth floor was operating like a well-oiled machine. Madoff could take time away from the office without fear of the scheme collapsing. He and Ruth loved France—especially the Riviera.
Bernie and Ruth had traveled there often, staying at the Hôtel du Cap Eden Roc in Cap d’Antibes, between Cannes and Nice. It is one of the most elegant hotels in the world, built on a cliff overlooking the Mediterranean and surrounded by a forest of pines. The yachts line up along the waterfront so that their owners can be ferried to the hotel’s outdoor terrace for lunch next to the pool. It was Bernie Madoff’s kind of place.
The Madoff villa was nearby, in an area of Cap d’Antibes known as Château des Pins.
Ruth and Bernie spent a lot of time and money collecting antiques and art for their French villa: a $35,000 painting bought at the Armory Show in New York, furniture from hidden Parisian shops, a leather chair from London. The villa was modest by the standards of many of the Riviera’s grand estates, but the Madoffs loved it.
“Nothing flashy at all,” said Nando Pignatelli, the former stock broker who often visited at the Madoffs’ place.
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