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Comments (0)The prison door has hardly clanged shut on Bernard Madoff’s 150-year sentence and already six books have appeared on this ex-Wall Street wheeler-dealer. Andrew Kirtzman’s “Betrayal” follows Madoff from his middle-class New York Jewish childhood to the unraveling of a Ponzi scheme that cost investors over $65 billion.
As Mr. Kirtzman makes clear, Madoff could not have accomplished this feat alone. Feeder funds and individual agents (sometimes not identified as such to investors) funneled clients to him in wealthy bastions like Palm Beach, Greenwich, Conn. and London.
Clues to Madoff’s scheme abounded. Harry Markopolos, a Boston watchdog, repeatedly warned the federal Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Industry publications raised questions. Credit Suisse cautioned its clients. France’s Societe Generale declined to invest, as did individual investors like Home Depot co-founder Ken Langone.
But others chose to ignore the clues. Among them was Madoff’s wife, Ruth, sons Mark and Andy and brother Peter—all of whom worked in parts of Madoff’s operation and lived lavish lifestyles that Kirtzman exhaustively recounts.
The book is good at evoking the milieus in which Madoff operated, like Jewish Palm Beach. Kirtzman interviewed over 100 people, from Madoff’s childhood friends to his personal secretary and driver. But Kirtzman did not have access to Madoff or other key players. This is a serious omission and, as a result, the book tends to focus on the superficial.
For readers who want an easy-to-understand recap of events, “Betrayal” works. But for others, who have been following the Madoff case since inception and would like to see a detailed analysis, “Betrayal” barely gets beyond speculation, pat answers and information that’s already been reported.