Participants in the Madoff investment scandal Stanley Chais, a philanthropist who invested heavily with Mr. Madoff, and Carl J. Shapiro, one of the money manager's oldest friends, are among at least eight Madoff investors and associates being scrutinized by the U.S. attorney's office in Manhattan. Prosecutors are continuing to probe Madoff family members and employees. Others include: Frank Avellino, a Florida accountant who ran an investment fund that invested client money; Noel Levine, a real-estate investor who works out of a two-room office on the 17th floor, next door to Madoff's fraudulent investment operation, and Palm Beach investor Robert Jaffe, a son-in-law of Mr. Shapiro who
Pyramid scheme Wales. Leaders of the scheme were prosecuted and served time in jail before being ordered to pay £500,000 in compensation and costs in 2015. The cost of bringing the prosecution was in excess of £1.4 million. Throughout 2010 and 2011 a number of authorities around the world including the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, the Bank of Namibia and the Central Bank of Lesotho have declared TVI Express to be a pyramid scheme. TVI Express, operated by Tarun Trikha from India has apparently recruited hundreds of thousands of "investors", very few of whom, it is reported, have recouped any of