Bernard Madoff Investment Scandal
Zuckerman is one of the investors defrauded in a "Ponzi Scheme," by way of investments with Fifth Avenue Synagogue president J. Ezra Merkin who staked roughly 10% ($30 million) of Zuckerman's charitable trust fund with convicted scammer Bernard Madoff. Zuckerman has stated that all current charitable obligations will still be honored with no changes. At a forum at the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research in New York, he remarked that no one since Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, executed in 1953 for giving atomic secrets to the Soviet Union, "has so damaged the image and self respect of American Jews."
On April 6, 2009, Zuckerman filed a lawsuit against J. Ezra Merkin and his Gabriel Capital LP. The lawsuit claims fraud and negligent representation and seeks unspecified punitive damages. Merkin had a “huge incentive not to disclose Madoff’s role, especially to investors like Zuckerman” because he charged clients “substantial fees” to manage both his Ascot Partners LP and Gabriel Capital. The lawsuit claims over US$40 million in losses for placing his assets with Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC without his knowledge. Zuckerman invested US$25 million with Merkin’s Ascot Fund in 2006 through his Charitable Remainder Trust or CRT Investments Limited and personally invested US$15 million with Merkin’s Gabriel Capital. Merkin charged Zuckerman a 1.5% fee and imposed significant “lock-up restrictions on redemptions,", but his agreement with Gabriel Capital contains an arbitration clause against Merkin for his lost personal US$15 million investment. The lawsuit also named the accounting firm BDO Seidman LLP and a related entity called BDO Tortuga as defendants.
The case is CRT Investments Ltd. v. J. Ezra Merkin, 601052/2009, filed in New York State Supreme Court (Manhattan).
Read more about this topic: Mortimer Zuckerman
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