The Day Bernie Madoff Dropped His Trousers
Very slowly, details are starting to emerge about the strange and crazy world of Madoff, and, here and there, are clues that, with hindsight, might have focused suspicion on the fraudster before he confessed to his crimes last December.
Fortune reveals, for instance, that it took a special pass to gain access to Madoff's back office processing area, based in offices in mid-Manhattan. And the IBM server which supported his scam operation was almost 30 years old, and many things had to be manually inputted. Despite it's age, and the fact that it often went wrong, Madoff repeatedly refused to replace it.
Bernie, in fact, appeared to have a phobia against technology (strange for a former Chairman of the NASDAQ, who claimed that he was involved in the design of its technology platform). According to the news magazine, Madoff didn't have a BlackBerry, didn't use e-mail, and had his computer set up so that he never had to turn it on (because he didn't know how to).
And Madoff appears to have been petrified every time US regulators came knocking on the door (mostly on routine visits). He is said to have often returned to the office immediately he was alerted to their presence, even flying back early from holidays.
Bernie could also apparently be a rather insensitive fellow. Fortune quotes an instance when a female member of Madoff's staff told the fraudster that she had a nightmare about being raped. 'That's not a nightmare, that's a fantasy!', came the reply.
And finally, as reported previously, Madoff had a thing for symmetry and straight-lines. His offices had to be decorated in the same way, in the same color schemes. Blinds had to be drawn to the same length, computer screens had to be at the same angle, and rugs had to be aligned. Fortune even says, that on one famous occasion, Madoff dropped his trousers just to show his staff that the 'line of of his shirt buttons was precisely vertical'.