A federal appeals court has rejected a plea by Ponzi schemer Bernie Madoff for an early release on compassionate grounds.
Madoff “was never truly remorseful,” Judge Denny Chin of the Court of Appeals in New York wrote in his decision Thursday to reject the request from February, The Associated Press . Madoff’s lawyers presented medical documents in the request saying he is dying of kidney cancer.
Chin sentenced Madoff in 2009 to 150 years in prison connected to the scheme that Madoff, who is Jewish, had been running for years. He scammed thousands of victims out of billions of dollars, including a number of Jewish organizations.
Madoff pleaded guilty to 11 felony charges related to money laundering, perjury and falsifying financial documents.
“Even at the end, he was trying to send more millions of his ill-gotten gains to family members, friends, and certain employees,” Chin wrote in his decision to reject the early release motion, AP reported.