US financier Bernard Madoff has been sentenced to 150 years for running Wall Street's biggest and most brazen bogus investment scheme.
The courtroom erupted in cheers and applause as US District Court Judge Denny Chin imposed the maximum possible prison sentence on the 71-year-old defendant.
Madoff stood facing the judge with his hands clasped in front of him as he learned his fate.
"The fraud here was staggering," Judge Chin said, after listening to angry statements from some of Madoff's victims.
Before his sentencing, Madoff addressed the court.
"I cannot offer you an excuse for my behaviour," he said, speaking in a calm voice. "How do you excuse betraying thousands of investors who entrusted me with their life savings?"
Wearing a dark business suit, leaning forward with his hands resting on a table, he said he tried to undo his crimes but "the harder I tried, the deeper a hole I dug for myself."
The confessed swindler apologised to his victims, at one point briefly turning in their direction while he spoke.
"I will live with this pain, with this torment, for the rest of my life," he said in calm, measured tones. "I live in a tormented state knowing the pain and suffering I have created."
Earlier, Madoff sat still, his eyes lowered, as victims came before the judge to tell how they were ruined financially, many having to sell their homes and live off Social Security.
Madoff has shown "no remorse," said victim Carla Hirschhorn, of Manalapan, New Jersey, at the hearing.
She told the court her life is a "living hell", her mother is dependent on social security and her daughter works two jobs to pay tuition.
None of the swindler's family came to court to see the drama. Madoff has made all of his court appearances in the last six months alone with his lawyers.
The judge said he had not received a single letter on Madoff's behalf, testifying to any good deeds or charitable works. "The absence of such support is telling," he said.
Madoff's wife Ruth, 68, has not been charged with any crimes but has been vilified by defrauded investors, shunned by people she once knew well, and pursued by the New York press.
Breaking her long silence on the case, she said in a statement after the sentencing that she was "betrayed and confused" by her husband's scam.
"From the moment I learned from my husband that he had committed an enormous fraud, I have had two thoughts - first, that so many people who trusted him would be ruined financially and emotionally, and second, that my life with the man I have known for over 50 years was over," she said.
Mr Sorkin told the court after the victims spoke that his client is a “deeply flawed human being.”
Madoff pleaded guilty to securities fraud, mail fraud, wire fraud, investment adviser fraud, three counts of money laundering, false statements, perjury, false filings with the SEC and theft from an employee benefit plan.
In a letter to US District Court Judge Denny Chin yesterday, Mr Sorkin argued for a sentence less than the life term requested by US prosecutors.
He disputed the size of the loss to investors, saying it “does not appear to rise to the historic proportions that the government has maintained.”
But Mr Sorkin added that he did not “seek to minimize the magnitude of the crimes to which Mr Madoff pled guilty”.
Madoff confessed to running a multibillion-dollar "Ponzi scheme" in which investors were paid returns from money paid by later investors.
Investigators do not know how much was stolen, according to court papers. Prosecutors say $170 billion flowed through the principal Madoff account over decades, and that weeks before the financier's December arrest the firm's statements showed a total of $65 billion in accounts.
The trustee winding down the Madoff firm has so far collected $1.2 billion to return to investors.
“Given the enormous amount of funds he has stolen and the number of victims, the sentence is going to be very, very high,” said Paul Radvany, a law professor at Fordham University in New York and a former federal prosecutor.
Mr Madoff's brother, Peter, and his sons, Mark and Andrew, held executive positions in the brokerage unit of Madoff's firm. Their lawyers say they were not aware of or involved in the crooked asset management side.
The judge allowed Mr Madoff, a former nonexecutive chairman of the Nasdaq stock market, to wear his own clothes at the sentencing hearing, instead of the loose-fitting uniform issued by the jail where he has been held since March 12th.
Mr Madoff has said all along that he committed the fraud on his own. He has not named any accomplices. The only other person charged is his outside accountant.
Agencies