By Nicole Powers

Harry Markopolos has a way with numbers. It’s this innate ability that led him to uncover Bernie Madoff’s epic Ponzi scheme almost a decade before market forces ultimately leveraged a confession out of the spectacularly crooked investment fund manager.

In 1999, while working as a portfolio manager at Rampart, a Boston based investment management company, Markopolos had been asked to reverse engineer a fund offered by Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC so his firm could compete by offering a similar product. After studying Madoff’s marketing material for a mere 5 minutes, Markopolos realized that the results the fund claimed to achieve were highly improbable, a further 4 hours of mathematical modeling proved the stated returns were categorically impossible by legal means.

Smelling a rat, Markopolos assembled an informal investigative team to probe Madoff’s operation further. In May 2000, when Madoff’s scheme was only a $3 to $7 billion fraud, they submitted their first whistleblowing report to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). It was summarily ignored. Frustrated but undeterred, Markopolos’ tenacious group, dubbed The Foxhounds, submitted numerous subsequent memos (in 2001, 2005, 2007 and 2008) offering even more evidence, to no avail. A 2005 missive had what one might consider to be an attention-grabbing title -“The World’s Largest Hedge Fund Is A Fraud” – but even this failed to get an appropriate response from those charged with policing Wall Street.

It was only following the crash of 2008, when Madoff’s investors were clamoring to liquidate their assets and he was unable to meet their demands, that the man responsible for the largest act of financial fraud in world history was forced to fess up. By then, Madoff’s “fund” had grown on paper to a value of $65 billion. In the following days, the complete and utter failure of the SEC came to light, as press outlets – who had also been alerted by Markopolos, but by and large had declined to report his findings before Madoff’s arrest – competed to interview the “Madoff whistleblower.” With egg on their faces, the government also sought out Markopolos’ knowledge and expertise, and on February 4, 2009 he delivered some riveting televised testimony in front of the House of Representatives’ Financial Services Subcommittee.

In March 2010, Markopolos published a book chronicling his investigations into Madoff and the utter incompetence he bore witness to during his dealings with the SEC. Called No One Would Listen: A True Financial Thriller, it became a New York Times bestseller. A new film, Chasing Madoff, based on the book is currently in cinemas. SuicideGirls caught up with Markopolos, who now works as a freelance investigative accountant exposing Fortune 500 wrongdoing, to talk about Madoff and the current state of play in our financial markets. We also asked him to focus his considerable financial acumen our nation’s balance sheet and assess the future prospects of our economy. Given Markopolos’ track record, his conclusions about America’s should-be junk status are indeed cause for concern, if not outright alarm.

Read our exclusive interview with Harry Markopolos on SuicideGirls.com.

Rydell Suicide in Dreams

• INTO: Helping to make the earth a better and happier place to be, Craves Cupcakes, cooking with someone I love, the smell of vector files in the morning, dancing around my house like an arse, reading, organization, learning languages, smelling yummy, drinking tea in my underwear, astronomy, and meditating.
• NOT INTO: Chocolate, bad moods, pants & socks, smell of patchouli, small talk (I suck at it), animal testing or cruelty, flaky friends, repeating myself, people who are blind to the world around them, shitty work ethics and laziness.
• MAKES ME HAPPY: My Weimaraner, loud music, my Mac, being barefoot, cleaning the house, fresh sheets, tulips, meditation, expanding the mind, target practice, muscle cars & grease, great pair of jeans, sexy heels, laying in a hammock, legwarmers traveling, pubs, Sunday walks, someone cooking for me, just sharing space with someone I love, watching the stars, strong connections and talking with friends.
• MAKES ME SAD: No one to snuggle, ignorance, fur, authority, self deprecating people, perpetual downers, being told what to do, no new ink, missing people I love, the state of our world, and vivisection.
• HOBBIES: Killing time…anyone know how to get blood out of the carpet?
• 5 THINGS I CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT: LaLicious Body Scrub, fresh ink, silence, meditation, my heart on my sleeve.
• VICES: Tattoos, boys with a lot tattoos (hand tattoos, sleeves), my bed, cheesecake, and CocaCola/Boylands Ginger Ale.
• I SPEND MOST OF MY FREE TIME: Working, meditating, swearing, playing with my Mac, hula hooping, and watching horror movies.

Get to know Rydell better over at SuicideGirls.com!

by Mimmi Suicide

The Kitchen is one of the groups that most frequently comes up when I ask Suicide Girls to pick their fave SG hangouts for our ongoing ‘Group Therapy‘ series. We’ve therefore decided to start a new recipe column culled from the culinary brain trust in SG’s Kitchen. In this first post, smokin’ hot Mimmi Suicide shows us how to make her signature dish, Vegan Chili with Guacamole. – Nicole Powers, SG Ed

Mimmi Suicide’s Vegan Chili with Guacamole

This is Suicide Girl Mimmi. I love cooking, so I’m really excited about the new blog series! This recipe is for my go-to-meal and comfort food, which I have cooked many, many times. It was the first vegan meal I ever cooked, and is loved by my vegan and omnivore friends alike. Please note that, until now, this recipe has only existed in my head, so I hope the measurements all work out 😉

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by Maple Suicide

A new column which features recommendations from App addict Maple Suicide.

>Instagram – iOS 4.0 devices FREE
This App has been released only through Apple so far, but it has become my “go-to” when it comes to editing and sharing photos throughout different social networking sites. One of the unique things about this application is that it has created its own social networking site, only accessible through Apple product iOS devices. The interface to the social aspect of this application is pretty similar to Twitter. You can follow other people’s Instagram photo feeds (including a bunch of us Suicide Girls!). Instagram is equipped with 16 custom designed filters as well as the option to keep the photo as is. You can also send the photo to your Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, and others. Instagram is unique, fun, and addicting!

>TweetDeck – iOS & Android devices FREE
TweetDeck is an application that allows you to link and manage multiple Twitter and Facebook accounts simultaneously. Most members and fellow SG’s tend to have personal/private profiles, as well as a profile for their alias/screen name, so this application is very handy. You can link up multiple Twitter and Facebook accounts, update them all at once, or make updates on them individually. TweetDeck streamlines photo updates too, allowing you to avoid the hassle of logging in and out, and going back and fourth between apps. TweetDeck also has features within its settings that give you options for image upload hosts, font size, as well as having Deck.ly built into the app (used for tweets that are more than 140 characters). TweetDeck definitely has made social networking easier and more convenient for me.

>GasBuddy – iOS, Android, Windows Phone & Blackberry FREE
I just moved to Chicago and try my best not to do any driving for two reasons: people here can’t drive properly and the city is too beautiful to not walk everywhere. However, sometimes I’m forced to get behind the wheel, and I unfortunately still end up doing a lot of driving to and from places. As you can imagine, when I need to fill up my tank, I try to spend as little as possible on gas. GasBuddy helps me find the cheapest fuel no matter where I am. I reckon I save about 50 cents a gallon, and the app offers directions to each station it suggests. GasBuddy is useful for anyone who’s on a road trip or just drives a lot and wants to find a good deal.

By Fred Topel

Britt Robertson is starring on a new show, The Secret Circle. Based on the books by The Vampire Diaries’ L.J. Smith and produced by Kevin Williamson, who also worked on the vampiric show, Secret Circle already has a bewitching fan base before it’s even on air. Last week Robertson was driving to the set at 3 PM for an evening shoot. She had a new movie opening and wanted to get the word out, so through the crackle of her cell phone we got an interview.

The Family Tree is an edgy indie dramedy about the Burnett family. Robertson plays Kelly Burnett, a provocative teenager who uses profanity to push her mother’s buttons. She even takes off her shirt at the breakfast table, though classily this scene is filmed from behind. Mrs. Burnett has an accident that gives her amnesia, so while the family deals with that drama, Kelly also gets involved with a fellow student and teacher’s secret relationship.

Robertson has been playing teenagers for some time, even though she’s now 21. She’s got one of those faces that still passes for 16, which can be an asset in casting calls. Her most visible role has been as Lux Cassidy on The CW’s drama Life Unexpected, which lasted two years. She also had a cameo in this year’s Scream 4.

On The Secret Circle, she plays Cassie Blake, who moves to the town of Chance Harbor after her mom’s death. There, the children of the other five witch families try to expose her to the secret past from which her mother always tried to protect her. Five episodes into her new show, this is still a new world for Robertson, so after discussing her new movie we caught up on the witchcraft of The Secret Circle.

Read our exclusive interview with Britt Robertson on SuicideGirls.com.

Machete Suicide in Ford

• INTO: Shows, music, dancing around in the car, drinking beer, cooking, elephants ( for their big trunks), art, sext messaging, carne asada tacos.
• NOT INTO: Sidekicks, Kraft cheese singles, The Beatles, pork, bouncers that take away your fake ID, really expensive clothes, The Fully Down, getting peed on in the shower.
• MAKES ME HAPPY: San Fran – I wanna move back soo bad, the West Coast is my true love.
• MAKES ME SAD: When I run out of beer/cigs.
• HOBBIES: Masturbating, cooking, drawing, belly dancing, and sex.
• 5 THINGS I CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT: Oreos, Earl Grey tea, Zune, conditioner, and oscar.
• VICES: Smoking, pot, drinking, and tattoos.
• I SPEND MOST OF MY FREE TIME: Being a big dork and telling really bad perverted jokes.

Get to know Machete better over at SuicideGirls.com!

by SG’s Team Agony feat. Dalila, Kraven and Sassie!

Let us answer life’s questions – because great advice is even better when it comes from SuicideGirls.

Q: I have been married for 4 months and my wife is 7 months pregnant. (We got engaged before pregnancy.) My wife is pretty much turned off to sex at this point. I understand she’s uncomfortable and maybe not in the mood, but she is entirely turned off to the point where we haven’t had relations in 3 weeks, and it was dwindling leading up to the current drought.

I am being shut out on all levels of sexual contact. No old fashioned. No oral favors. Nothing! I’m trying to be supportive of her and not push it but at this point I’m thinking I’m not getting laid till Christmas. Please help! What should I do?

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