The cops came looking for one of Ponzi king Bernard Madoff’s sons yesterday — but not over investor fraud.
Mark Madoff, the stressed-out former head trader at his dad’s firm, went missing after a bitter argument with his wife, who frantically called police fearing for his safety.
That ignited a police search that ended only when Mark returned home, revealed that he had spent the night in a ritzy hotel and told cops he was headed to seek help from a doctor, The Post has learned.
Mark Madoff, 45, also told cops yesterday that he had recently been under duress, law-enforcement sources said.
The incident comes two weeks after Mark, younger brother Andrew, their uncle, Peter Madoff, and cousin Shana were sued for nearly $200 million by Irving Picard, the federal bankruptcy trustee overseeing the breakup of Bernard Madoff’s firm, where they all worked.
Mark, who was known as the outgoing frontman at his dad’s firm, reportedly is prone to depressive mood swings and physical ailments, including stomach troubles.
Sources said Mark had a bitter argument with his wife, Stephanie, in their SoHo apartment Wednesday night.
At about 8 p.m., Mark stormed out of the Mercer Street apartment. He returned an hour later and resumed the verbal sparring, sources said.
But Mark again stomped out and stalked across the street to a parking garage, where he hopped on a Vespa scooter he keeps there and sped off, sources said.
Hours later, at about 1:30 a.m., a worried Stephanie called cops to report him missing.
When Mark reappeared at his SoHo residence yesterday morning, he told Stephanie he had spent the night at the nearby Soho Grand Hotel after checking in under a different name and paying cash, according to sources.
Madoff then called police and said that he was OK — but also that he has been under a significant amount of stress recently, sources said.
The Ponzi son then told cops he planned to visit his doctor at Weill Cornell Medical Center on the Upper East Side.
His lawyer, Martin Flumenbaum, did not return a call seeking comment.
The recently filed suit by bankruptcy trustee Picard says Mark and the other Madoff relatives should have seen signs of Bernie’s $65 billion fraud “but either failed to make sufficient inquiry or knew of the fraud, ignored it and profited from it.”
Picard claims the firm “was operated as if it were the family piggy bank” that relatives used to fund lavish lifestyles.
Mark Madoff, who earned as much as $5 million annually, married Stephanie, his second wife, in a million-dollar-plus wedding on Nantucket in 2003. The couple later paid $6.5 million for a 3.3-acre spread and McMansion on the island.
Additional reporting by Jeane MacIntosh and Jessica Simeone