In remarks prepared for delivery at a civic group meeting in West Palm Beach, Florida, Holder said the task force was also targeting financial discrimination.
"To those who see victimization of others as an avenue to wealth, take notice: If you fabricate a financial statement, if you propagate an investment scheme, if you are complicit in an act of financial fraud, you are writing your ticket to jail," Holder said.
Reuters obtained an advance copy of his speech.
Holder said financial crime had become all too common and Palm Beach "is, in many respects, ground zero for the $65 billion Ponzi scheme perpetrated by Bernard Madoff -- the largest investor fraud case in our nation's history."
Madoff owned an 8,700-square foot home nearby. The mansion's value will be known when federal marshals auction it, Holder said. Reuters
Excerpt of Eric Holder's speech:
One of the greatest and most glaring threats facing our economy is the presence of financial fraud, particularly in our securities and financial markets.
Across numerous administrations, Democratic and Republican alike, the Department of Justice has worked hard to combat financial fraud and to recover ill-gotten gains for the benefit of those victimized by fraud. Despite these efforts, however, we know that financial fraud persists. Just this week, The Wall Street Journal reported that “crisis and fraud in the securities and investment banking industries are at their highest levels since records began.”
The simple truth is that financial crimes have become all too common. And the consequences of these schemes and scams are real, as this community knows all too well. Palm Beach is, in many respects, ground zero for the $65-billion Ponzi scheme perpetrated by Bernard Madoff -- the largest investor fraud case in our nation’s history.
Before the house of cards Madoff built collapsed in 2008, before he was sentenced to 150 years in prison last June, before he became a notorious criminal on the cover of newspapers around the world, he was one of your neighbors.
His former home sits just north of us. An 8,700 square-foot mansion that’s worth …. Well, we’ll know what its worth once the U.S. Marshals Service auctions it off and the proceeds are distributed to Madoff’s victims.
We all look forward to that day. But we also know that we are unlikely ever to recover all of the money that Madoff stole. And as a result of his crimes, too many people who once dreamed of retirement now fear that they will become burdens upon their families. Too many who once looked forward to the future now fear it. Too many promises can no longer be kept -- promises made to charities and schools, to churches and synagogues, to children and grandchildren.
The ripple effect of Mr. Madoff’s greed and deception is as breathtaking as it is heartbreaking. Unfortunately, his crimes, as significant as they were, merely represent a much larger problem, a problem that was brought into stark focus over the last year. In times of recession, when every dollar counts and each dollar is counted, financial wrongdoing comes to light. Unbalanced books are revealed. Pyramid schemes collapse.
Last year, Allen Stanford, Tom Petters and, most recently, Fort Lauderdale attorney Scott Rothstein – who is alleged to have run a $1 billion investment scam – joined Bernie Madoff in becoming headline news and household names. I’m proud that these men, along with more than 450 others convicted of corporate and securities fraud in 2009, have been taken out of the game. And I’m heartened that the Department of Justice, at last count, is moving forward on more than 5,000 pending Financial Institution Fraud cases.
But I also realize that this is just a snapshot of what we’re up against.
Read the entire transcript at DOJ
