Guesstimate Bernie Madoff's Sentence

Posted by Bess Levin, Jun 29, 2009, 9:39am

Picture 1611.pngAhead of the 10AM moment of truth, make your best guess now, Price Is Right style. Closest without going over will receive your choice of either a) a DealBreaker mug or b) a headshot signed by Charlie Gasparino. For reference, prosecutors want 150, Team Bernie wants 12.

Oh, just so you know:

In a letter to the court, Ira Sorkin, Madoff's attorney, made an initial recommendation of a 12-year prison term, one year short of what Sorkin asserts to be Madoff's life expectancy. What the letter does not point out -- but what Judge Chin surely knows -- is that a sentence of 12 years would actually only add up to about 9 years in federal prison. Here's the math: Madoff has served over 3 months already, and under the federal Bureau of Prisons rules, he gets a 15% reduction for good time, which could deduct about 21 more months from the sentence. Finally, under the recently enacted Second Chance Act, he could even serve the last year of his term in home confinement if a pilot program becomes the norm -- leaving about 9 years in federal prison.

Update: Judge Chin has put it out there that the federal probation department is recommending 50 years, without commenting whether or not he feels that'd be a reasonable sentence or if they ought to GTFO.

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