Harry Markopolos

Harry M. Markopolos (born October 22, 1956) is a Greek American forensic accounting and financial fraud investigator and former securities industry executive best known for initially discovering Bernie Madoff's Ponzi scheme in the late 1990s. From 1999 to 2008, Markopolos uncovered evidence that suggested that Madoff's wealth management business was a fraudulent Ponzi scheme. In 2000, 2001, and 2005, Markopolos alerted the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of his views, supplying supporting documents, but each time the SEC ignored him or gave his evidence only a cursory investigation. Madoff was finally revealed to be a fraud in December 2008, when his sons contacted the Federal Bureau of Investigation. After admitting to operating the largest private Ponzi scheme in history, Madoff was sentenced in 2009 to 150 years in prison. In 2010, Markopolos's book on uncovering the Madoff fraud, No One Would Listen: A True Financial Thriller, was published. Markopolos has criticized the SEC for failing to discover the Madoff fraud despite repeated tips, and for failing to investigate properly the larger companies it supervised.