Madoff Receives De Facto Life Sentence

You have likely heard by now that Bernie Madoff was sentenced to 150 years in prison for masterminding the massive fraud -- the "longest, largest, and most widespread Ponzi scheme in history" -- that devastated the lives of the investors whose savings he swindled.

150 years -- that's a long time. The maximum sentence, in fact. As NPR reports, it is equivalent to one day in prison for every $1.2 million Madoff stole in his $65 billion scheme. And it all but guarantees that Madoff will spend the rest of his life behind bars:

Mr. Madoff, looking thinner and more haggard than when he pleaded guilty in March, stood impassively as Federal District Judge Denny Chin condemned his crimes as “extraordinarily evil” and imposed a sentence that was three times as long as the federal probation office suggested and more than 10 times as long as defense lawyers had requested...

In remarks before announcing his decision, Judge Chin acknowledged that any sentence beyond a dozen years or so would be largely symbolic for Mr. Madoff, who is 71 and has a life expectancy of about 13 years.

But “symbolism is important for at least three reasons,” he said, citing the need for retribution, deterrence and a measure of justice for the victims.

So Madoff essentially received a life sentence for a crime that did not involve loss of human life. This may seem fundamentally unfair, until you consider the effect of Madoff's crimes on his victims' lives. While it is true that no victims died as a result of the fraud, their lives -- at least as they knew them -- nevertheless were abruptly ended:

Nine victims, some choked by sobs or swiping at tears, told the court of the damage he had caused, describing him as a psychopath and a monster who had destroyed their lives.

“It feels like a nightmare that we can’t awake from,” said Carla Hirschhorn, a physical therapist who said her daughter was juggling two jobs in her junior year to help pay for college expenses that their lost savings were supposed to cover.

Michael Schwartz, who said Mr. Madoff had stolen money set aside to sustain his disabled brother, expressed the hope that “his jail cell will become his coffin.”

What's your take? Is this a fair sentence, befitting the crime? Do you agree that it is largely a symbolic sentence, or (as Mr. Madoff's attorney argued) an act of "mob vengeance"? Personally, I'm not losing any sleep over this sentence. If we can sentence teenagers to die in prison without questioning our societal ethics, then we can certainly do the same for a grown man who understood full well that he was ruining lives with his greed.