Uh, thanks Mr. Madoff? One divorcé may now recoup millions from his divorce settlement because of the Ponzi schemer. An appeals court has ruled that Paul, Weiss lawyer Steven Simkin didn't have to pay his ex-wife all of the money he had previously been ordered to. You see, back when Simkin and his wife of 30 years, Laura Blank, were getting their divorce in 2006 he thought he had $5.4 million invested with Bernie Madoff. So naturally he agreed to pay her $2.7 million. And then this happened.
Now an appeals court has ruled 2-1 that Simkin and Blank made "a mutual mistake" when they were splitting assets and accounts, with the majority ruling that as far as the Madoff account was concerned "there was no account which could be liquidated, as became apparent when Madoff received $7 billion worth of 'liquidation' calls from investors in 2008."
Blank isn't going to be taking this one lying down though—her lawyer is planning on challenging the decision. And their logic isn't bad: since Simkin took out money in 2006 to payoff his ex-wife why is it her fault that he didn't divest himself of the rest before everything collapsed in 2008?
