‘Extricate Myself’
Though Madoff said he alone was responsible, others also went to jail. His brother, Peter, the firm’s chief compliance officer, pleaded guilty to securities fraud and falsifying records and was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Prosecutors said he filed regulatory statements claiming the firm had only 23 accounts, when the real number exceeded 4,000, a lie that helped avert scrutiny by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. A settlement with the trustee required his family to forfeit assets valued at $90 million held by his wife, his daughter and others.

Madoff’s key lieutenant, Frank DiPascali Jr., and two of his former accountants, David Friehling and Paul Konigsberg, also pleaded guilty. In March 2014, a jury in Manhattan convicted five former Madoff assistants of having aided the fraud. Friehling was sentenced to two years’ probation, including a year under house arrest. Konigsberg also avoided prison, agreeing to forfeit $4.4 million of commissions his firm received for Madoff clients. DiPascali died of lung cancer in May 2015 before his scheduled sentencing.

Family Fallout
As for Madoff himself, he lost not just his wealth and freedom but the once-strong bonds of family.

The oldest of his two sons, Mark Madoff, who had been head of sales at the firm, killed himself on Dec. 11, 2010, the second anniversary of his father’s arrest. He was found hanging from a dog leash attached to a pipe in the living room of his Manhattan apartment.

His suicide was the final straw for his mother, Ruth Madoff, who said it prompted her to break off all communications with her imprisoned husband.

“I was responsible for my son Mark’s death, and that’s very, very difficult,” Bernard Madoff said in a May 2013 telephone interview from prison, according to CNN Money. “I live with that. I live with the remorse, the pain I caused everybody, certainly my family, and the victims.”

In September 2014, his son, Andrew, died of cancer.

Heart Attack
Madoff underwent surgery to open a clogged artery following a heart attack, Politico reported in March 2014 after interviewing him at the prison. At that time, Madoff said he was on medication for his heart, kidneys, blood pressure and anxiety, and also was undergoing weekly counseling.

“I can’t tell you how many hours I’ve spent with the psychiatrist, to try to make some sort of peace with myself, to understand how I did it,” he said, according to Politico. “I’d like to believe that there was something mentally wrong with me. It would make me feel better.”

Bernard Lawrence Madoff was born on April 29, 1938, to Ralph Madoff and the former Sylvia Muntner, known as Susie. He grew up in the middle-class Jewish neighborhood of Laurelton, in the New York borough of Queens, with an older sister, Sondra, and a younger brother, Peter.

SEC Case
His father worked for Manhattan-based Everlast Sporting Goods Manufacturing Co., the maker of boxing equipment, before opening his own sporting-goods manufacturer, Dodger Sporting Goods Corp., which sold the Joe Palooka punching bag. The company filed for bankruptcy in 1951 after struggling with rising raw-material prices due to the Korean War, Diana B. Henriques wrote in “The Wizard of Lies: Bernie Madoff and the Death of Trust” (2011).

His father then set up a brokerage firm, Gibraltar Securities, in his wife’s name and at the family home’s address. The SEC, in 1963, accused the company of failing to file required financial reports, and the Madoffs withdrew their registration.

Lawn Sprinklers
Madoff made the swim team at Far Rockaway High School, worked as a lifeguard and made extra money installing lawn sprinklers. He met his future wife, Ruth Alpern, when both were teenagers.

He left home for the University of Alabama, lasting six months before transferring to Hofstra University on New York’s Long Island. He graduated in 1960 with a degree in political science. By then, he had married Ruth and filed papers to open Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities.