Mapping Bernard Madoff's $50bn 'fraud'
Mapping Bernard Madoff's $50bn 'fraud'
Suzy Jagger in New York
If a demographer were to draw a map of the US and colour in the areas where the highest concentration of wealthy Americans were to be found, he would have produced this map.
As this map so clearly shows, there was nothing random about the clients Bernard Madoff targeted.
The highest concentration of Madoff alleged victims lies in the rich, old-money states of North-East America - Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine, and Maryland. Connecticut, in particular.
It is no coincidence that Connecticut is the wealthiest state in America - per capita - it is also one of the easiest commutes to Manhattan.
Many of the wealthy hedge fund managers, bankers and financiers who work in Midtown Manhattan commute by train from Grand Central on a 40-minute journey to their country homes in Connecticut.
It is Greenwich, Connecticut, known as the richest suburb in the US, where Walter Noel, the hedge fund manager, founded and ran Greenwich Fairfield, which was the biggest feeder fund for Mr Madoff and which lost around $7.2 billion in the scam.
He also has a house there where he and his socially-ambitious wife, Monica, would regularly invite guests, many of whom were Madoff clients.
Florida was also a favoured breeding ground for new clients for Mr Madoff.
Apart from wealthy retirees - known as snowbirds because they flee the cold climate of the northern states - many of the smart New York moneyed set have second or third homes in Palm Beach, Florida, which is just a few hours flight from Manhattan.
When the Madoff scandal first broke at the beginning of December, it was the members of elite Florida golf clubs who quickly emerged as early victims of the 70-year-old's fraud.
Neither is the sprinkling of victims across the Midwest states of America random.
The biggest sprinkles are in wealthy hot spots such as Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico - chosen by the rich either for ski homes or ranches. Until the property bubble popped around three years ago, Arizona and New Mexico boasted some of the most expensive real estate in the country.
But it is the concentration of victims in California on the West Coast, which so neatly explains Mr Madoff's most important business skill.
Mr Madoff was able to perpetrate wealthy, elite social circles - which would normally be networks closed to outsiders - through key individuals (often hedge fund managers) who introduced new clients to his business.
For example, Mr Madoff was able to break into the wealthy Jewish set in New York, mainly through introductions by J Ezra Merkin, the president of the Fifth Avenue synagogue - the richest of its kind in America.
While Mr Madoff is Jewish, he never visited the Fifth Avenue Syngogue himself. Equally, Hollywood represented a similar opportunity to target clients from an elite, and closed, social network.
Through a handful of key financial advisers, Mr Madoff was able to draw in the likes of Steven Spielberg and Kevin Bacon.
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you can really see how the victims live in the same neighborhoods on this map www.MadoffMap.com
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