‘The View’: Madoff’s Daughter-in-Law Breaks Down Over Husband’s Suicide

Stephanie Madoff-Mack on "The View." (ABC)

Stephanie Madoff Mack’s appearance today on “The View” proved what millions of American already know: Bernie Madoff’s 150-year prison sentence may provide some solace to those victimized by the disgraced financier’s multi-billion dollar Ponzi scheme, but the emotional wounds caused by his crimes may never fully heal.

Madoff Mack, the widow of Bernie Madoff’s son Mark, sat down with the ladies of “The View” to promote her book, “The End of Normal,” which details her life with Mark Madoff before and after his suicide.

When asked by the show’s hosts about the events leading up to her husband’s death, Madoff Mack, her voice quivering, described Mark falling into a deep depression after news of his father’s Ponzi scheme broke. According to a teary-eyed Madoff Mack, her husband had tried to commit suicide once before, but promised his wife he would never attempt it again. In the days leading up to his death, Madoff Mack described her husband as being in good spirits, and left him alone with their two-year-old son while she took their daughter on a trip to Disneyworld. It was during that trip that Mark Madoff hanged himself with a dog leash, with his sleeping child only a room away.

Madoff Mack said that her husband’s suicide was not the result of any guilt on his part, but instead was the result of the intense scrutiny he was under because of his father’s crimes and his confusion over how his father, his idol, could commit such heinous acts. “I think [Mark] did it because he thought we would be better off,” a tearful Madoff Mack explained. “He just couldn’t get over the betrayal.”

n a correspondence between Madoff Mack and her father-in-law, Bernie Madoff wrote, “I pray that you never have to experience the pain and torment I live with… I blame myself for everything that’s happened. Nothing will ever change this. You ask how I can live with myself – I can’t, and I don’t know how much longer I go on.”

Despite Madoff’s semblance of an apology, Madoff Mack confessed, “I will never forgive Bernie Madoff. I hold him responsible for my husband’s death.”

When asked how she wanted her husband to be remembered, Madoff Mack said, “Everyone should know that Mark Madoff was an honorable man and that he was duped by Bernie Madoff too.”