Money | 03/02/2009 4:45 pm

Vanity Fair: Family That Peddled Madoff Fund Now Social Pariahs

Walter and Monica Noel have multimillion-dollar homes in Southampton, Palm Beach and Mustique, but few friends, according to Vanity Fair

By The Staff at wowOwow.com

Image via NY Post

Dashed family fortunes are common enough these days, but one Greenwich, CT, family lost more than its towering wealth. Walter and Monica Noel, whose extended, well-connected family were profiled by Vanity Fair in 2002, are being snubbed by the snobby social circles they once occupied, according to a follow-up article in the magazine’s April edition.

Why the cold shoulder? The Noels ran Fairfield Greenwich Group, an unwitting feeder fund for Bernie Madoff’s $60 billion Ponzi scheme that they peddled to wealthy friends and neighbors at lavish events and exclusive clubs across the country. Those friends are now understandably bitter.

Southampton neighbors like Tom Wolfe, Ezra Zilkha and Chuck Scarborough found the nouveau riche clan loud and annoying ...

At holiday parties following Madoff’s arrest in December — including a soiree hosted by former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani at the Metropolitan Club — guests shunned the couple and seemed genuinely annoyed by their presence, according to media reports.

It doesn’t help that Southampton neighbors like Tom Wolfe, Ezra Zilkha and Chuck Scarborough found the nouveau riche clan loud and annoying long before the scandal broke, reports Vanity Fair.

The family, which is getting trashed in the press, has since scaled back its social calendar, choosing instead to lay low. Walter Noel, the 78-year-old family patriarch, is also facing several lawsuits over his company’s dealings with Madoff.

For their part, the Noels insist they’re victims of the disgraced money manager, not accomplices: "What this monster has done to so many people including us is known in the bible as an abomination," Andrés Piedrahita, the Noel’s son-in-law, wrote in a note to family and friends canceling an extravagant party for his 50th birthday in Majorca last month.

True, but was he also worried no one would show up?

16 Reader Comments (so far…) Sign In or Register to comment

I guess they are finding out who their friends are. I haven’t lost any friends as a result of losing a tidy sum with Madoff - in fact, schadenfreude about my loss has probably buoyed up my friends as they deal with their own losses in the stock market (I have those too, unfortunately). Moreover, I don’t blame the person who got me into Madoff’s fund. He lost far, far more than I did and, if I was happy to be grateful for his help when I was, apparently, making money, how can I blame him now.

Maybe, the Noels weren’t very nice people in the first place?

By Sam Mirando on 03/02/2009 5:13 pm

e-mail alert

Sam -I am sorry that you are a victim of Madoff.

Do you think that the ‘Guilt by Association’ shoes fit the Noels?

By Green Tears on 03/02/2009 5:53 pm

e-mail alert

High society is a nasty can of worms these days, I guess.

By Ms. Dee on 03/02/2009 6:17 pm

e-mail alert

People say that those who invested with Madoff were greedy and should have realized that the returns he was reporting could not be real. However, many people, such as my husband and I, invested in the 1990s when lots of people were getting much higher returns. The investment actually seemed conservative, with, every month, a detailed statement of purchases and sales of stocks in Fortune 500 companies and even a Fidelity mutual fund (a non-existent one, with a name similar to others that do exist). We never took any money out, just watched our principal grow. Others took money out regularly and still others closed out their accounts at a big profit. Madoff always (until Dec. 11 of last year) paid people promptly, no matter how much of their money they asked for.

The Noels were making money by funneling other people’s money to Madoff and taking their cut - a common practice. Luckier people have happily funneled money through other intermediaries to other hedge or mutual funds and been happy with their returns and happy to pay the intermediary.

It seems absurd, when the SEC found nothing wrong with Madoff’s operation, to blame those who invested either directly or indirectly or those who acted as intermediaries.

Madoff is a crook who ran a Ponzi scheme in plain sight. Harry Markopolous, the Boston accountant, saw through the scam after looking at publicly available information from and about Madoff’s business for a mere couple of hours. In spite of repeated efforts by Markopolous, thhe SEC refused to investigate or conducted a hopelessly amateur investigation. The bottom line is that the SEC is to blame for allowing Madoff to prosper and Madoff is a crook (as are, perhaps, some of his family members and associates). It is possible that some of the "feeders" were in on the scam but, if they lost millions too, they are not guilty by association; they are impoverished by association - that’s all.

By Sam Mirando on 03/02/2009 6:22 pm

e-mail alert

I guess having money, power and influence doesn’t pay all the time. It would be uncomfortable to know that you duped people if you knew what was going on.

By g c on 03/02/2009 6:25 pm

e-mail alert

This was to be expected, the Noel’s can’t possibly be shocked. They are now social pariahs, as they should be. The reality is there are THOUSANDS of stinking…filthy…rich men and women who are shaking in their shoes right now. Does anyone really believe Madoff was the only one engaging in this unscrupulous activity?

There are a whole lot of people who like Madoff, when they started to see the market plummet, panicked because they knew their little shell game couldn’t continue. People who are scrambling as you and me are on-line right this moment, changing, hiding and altering paperwork and documents. Hiding money and doing all they can to hide their dishonest deeds.

From what I have read as much as most Americans agree that the names of those affected by Madoff’s scheme shouldn’t be published; the unfortunate part is many have to be named because some (as is the case of the Noel’s) have some culpability even though they may have loss money in the process. So it’s to the public’s best interest to know their names.

By Belinda Joy on 03/02/2009 6:36 pm

e-mail alert

There is a big difference between individuals who had personal accounts (people who are far from "stinking…filthy…rich" such as myself) and the people who owned hedge funds that fed other people’s money to the Madoff machine. Moreover, there is also nothing intrinsically dishonest about being rich if a person made his or her money honestly. Indeed, Americans have always admired the rich far more than Europeans ever did. In Europe, ostentation was frowned upon and still is, to some extent. In America, it is gobbled up by a public that would far rather read about celebrities and "lifestyles of the rich and famous" than about science, politics or economics.

I read the article in Vanity Fair about the Noels and they don’t sound like very nice people. However, they were fêted in all the magazines before this scandal broke. And the reason that magazines wrote about them is because the public buys magazines for such articles.

Now, there is all manner of self-righteous primping and backbiting directed at the very same people who were admired last year for being RICH. I guess RICH isn’t "in" any more.

By Sam Mirando on 03/02/2009 7:42 pm

e-mail alert

I think you hit the nail on the head. Sorry for your loss. I am sure some of the people towards the top had to suspect at one time or another that something wasn’t quite kosher but perhaps ignorance is bliss.

Our priorities as a country need to change. The devotion to the Lifestyles of the Rich and the Famous is becoming quite nauseating especially knowing that many of them are lower then common thieves.

By g c on 03/03/2009 9:43 am

e-mail alert

Thanks g c. See my reply below…

By Sam Mirando on 03/03/2009 12:17 pm

e-mail alert

"yawn"

By Catherine Kaiman on 03/03/2009 3:31 am

e-mail alert

Sam, sorry to hear about your losses, I hope Madoff burns in hell for what he has done.

By Catherine Kaiman on 03/03/2009 3:33 am

e-mail alert

Thank you g c and Katherine for your kind words. You know, when you write "losses," I realize that you could be talking about losses of loved ones. Losses of money are nothing by comparison. Fortunately, my work is well paid and I shall just start saving again for my retirement. My parents were penniless (and orphaned) refugees from Hitler and they taught me that loss of money is nothing compared to loss of loved ones. So I count my blessings not my money.

By Sam Mirando on 03/03/2009 12:16 pm

e-mail alert

Sam

I was fortunate enough to have Grandparents from the depression and WWII times my Grandpa just passed at 90. He was a pilot in WWII. He lost abrother who was also a pilot who joined the Brit RAF before we were in he was shot down by a uboat in the english channel and did not make it. They passed along many words of wisdom as I’m sure did your parents. That generation was made of some tough stuff. They certainly understood what was really valuable. I feel sorry for many of these people who have lost so much that are my grandparents age, it is just sad and outrageous.

By g c on 03/03/2009 1:56 pm

e-mail alert

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:”Table Normal”; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:”“; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:”Calibri”,”sans-serif”; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:”Times New Roman”; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;}

I am a Madoff Victim. We have a proactive group of over 300 victims that have come together in an effort to find recovery. Together, we offer support and knowledge. This is a secure group that empowers victims to change the system that allowed this fraud to happen and allows them to unite in restitution.
If you are a victim, or know someone who is, please go to:

bernardmadoffvictims.org.

We feel there is strength in numbers and as such, have made contact with many legislators in an effort to get fair and just recovery.

For more information about the group, visit the following websites:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=100601125

http://www.foxbusiness.com/story/personal-finance/financial-planning/mad…

http://www.foxbusiness.com/video-search/m/21941880/tax-break-for-madoff-…

We know that together we will prevail..
Ronnie Sue Ambrosino

By Ronnie Sue Ambrosino on 03/04/2009 12:25 am