There are signs that with Bernard Madoff convicted and jailed for orchestrating an estimated $65 billion Ponzi scheme, the attention is now shifting to the so-called “feeder funds” that supplied Madoff with much of the cash to keep his schemes going. On April 1, the Massachusetts secretary of state sued the Fairfield Greenwich Group. And now, Modern Orthodox scion J. Ezra Merkin is in the crosshairs.

New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is suing Merkin for funneling funds to Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi scheme allegedly without proper due diligence or the knowledge of his investors. Merkin is also being sued by real estate magnate and publisher Mort Zuckerman, who claims to have lost $40 million with Madoff via Merkin. (Full disclosure: The Forward Association, which owns this newspaper, lost approximately $355,000 through an indirect investment in one of Merkin’s funds.)

The suits will turn the spotlight back onto Merkin, a son German immigrant Hermann Merkin — Hermann founded and funded a number of major New York institutions, including Merkin Hall near Lincoln Center and the Fifth Avenue Synagogue — and brother of Daphne Merkin, a prominent writer. J. Ezra Merkin was on the board of a number of major Modern Orthodox institutions that lost money in the Madoff debacle, including Yeshiva University and the Ramaz day school.

Forwarding the News

Thoughtful, balanced reporting from the Forward and around the web, bringing you updated news and analysis each day.

Terms(Required)

I agree to the Forward's Terms of Service and Privacy Policy

Email(Required)

The ongoing legal battles — and the colossal legal fees sure to follow — don’t bode well for Merkin’s world-class collection of paintings by modernist master Mark Rothko.

The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

2X match on all Passover gifts!

$90 → $180 $180 → $360

$360 → $720

Other amount