Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme played out across the front pages of New York tabloids, but the deaths of his sister and brother-in-law may be more private thanks to a victims’ rights law in Florida.
Sondra Wiener, the 87-year-old sister of Madoff, and husband Marvin Wiener, 90, were found dead Thursday at their Valencia Lakes home in Boynton Beach, about 60 miles north of Miami, the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office confirmed Sunday.
Both suffered gunshot wounds and officials said the scene “appears to be a murder/suicide.”
An official cause of death is pending an investigation by the medical examiner.
No other details were released, but the couple’s family has invoked Marsy’s Law, which protects the privacy rights of crime victims.
Marsy’s Law was first passed in California in November 2008, named after University of California Santa Barbara student Marsalee (Marsy) Ann Nicholas, who was stalked and killed by her ex-boyfriend in 1983. A week later, on the way home from the funeral, her mother was confronted in the grocery store checkout line by her daughter’s killer, who was, unbeknownst to her, out on bail.
The law, sponsored by Marsy’s brother, Dr. Henry T. Nicholas III, aims to provide privacy rights to the victims and their families, both in keeping information confidential and in providing updates on issues like criminal proceedings.
Florida’s version was passed by voters in November 2018.
The law is currently headed to the Florida Supreme Court after two Tallahassee police officers invoked it to protect their own identities after fatally shooting a man in May 2020. The officers have argued that the man, Tony McDade, threatened them after stabbing a neighbor’s son to death, making them victims as well.
Bernie Madoff, the disgraced financier behind the $20 billion Ponzi scheme, died last year at age 82 while serving a 150-year sentence in federal prison. His older son, Mark, died by suicide in 2010, and his younger son, Andrew, died of cancer in 2014.
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