Victims of Bernard Madoff’s massive fraud are crying foul over prosecutors’ plans to seek “extraordinary” leniency for his frontman.
In a series of letters filed yesterday in Manhattan federal court, burned investors demanded harsh punishment for Madoff’s former CFO, Frank DiPascali Jr., who pleaded guilty last year and is assisting with the probe of Madoff’s $65 billion Ponzi scheme.
“Cooperation with prosecutors does not convert this ignoble criminal, whose actions have harmed members of my family in this generation, the next and the one after that, into a man who deserves your mercy or compassion,” victim Ann Altman wrote the judge.
Urging “the strongest sentence allowable under law,” victim Robert Jacobson wrote, “This is not vengeance but merely a hope that it may serve notice to other conspirators in financial scams that their misdeeds will not be treated lightly despite any assistance they may render to authorities.”
Investors Kenneth and Lisa Gutner said the only way DiPascali should get a break is if he reveals a hidden hoard of cash that could be distributed to Madoff’s victims.
“Without such disclosure, Frank deserves to be put away from society and forced to sit in prison to contemplate his evil ways for a very long time,” they wrote.
Retired teacher Ellenjoy Fields of Boston wrote that DiPascali “needs to pay his dues for the horrible things he has done to so many innocent people.”
Fields said she had more than $800,000 in retirement funds on account when Madoff was busted in 2008.
DiPascali “was the main guy. When you called up to put money in or take money out, he’d be the one, or his office, to be taking all this information,” Fields, 68, told The Post. “To me, he was the hub of the wheel. I don’t know where Bernie was.
“I don’t think that he should be sitting out here and smelling the coffee and the roses.”
DiPascali faces 125 years in prison after pleading guilty to 10 counts last year, but prosecutors recently revealed that they expected to file an “extraordinary letter” seeking leniency due to the “substantial assistance” he has provided.
DiPascali remained locked up in a Westchester County jail yesterday after failing to meet the terms of a $10 million bond package.
His lawyer, Marc Mukasey, didn’t return a call for comment. A spokeswoman for the Manhattan US Attorney’s Office declined to discuss the case.