What Do Mitt Romney And "Sir" Allen Stanford Have In Common?

The obvious, of course, is that both Romney and Stanford worked up business models that involved financial manipulation, lax off shore Caribbean islands and Swiss bank accounts. But Sir Allen is headed for another 110 years in prison for his fraud and Romney is headed for electoral victories in America's poorest, least educated and most socially backward states-- basically the South and the Mormon domains out West. We started covering Sir Allen in 2009 when he first got caught in a seven billion dollar ponzi scheme and it was revealed that he had found the most corrupt members of Congress-- from John Boehner to Rahm Emanuel-- to lavish immense amounts of bribery and protection money on. He gave at least a million and a half dollars to the Republican and Democratic election committees, like the corruption-soaked DCCC and NRCC.

Short version: Stanford bought a phony "knighthood" from Antigua and set up an offshore bank there that ran a Ponzi scam and ripped off billions from investors. At the time he was apprehended about 3 years ago, we mentioned that

U.S. prosecutors pointed out that Stanford's business practices put the “integrity of the markets” at risk. Stanford is being held without bail since he is considered a 100% flight risk, already having been apprehended trying to escape on a chartered jet. He's been in jail in Virginia and said he was anxious to get back to Texas, a state where they know how to take care of well-connected rich white people.

The update is that this week he was sentenced to 110 years in prison with no possibility of parole. He isn't taking it well-- nor is he in the slightest bit contrite. In fact, he sounds like a case study in billionaire entitlement.

Jaime Escalona was fleeced so thoroughly by the financier R. Allen Stanford that he could no longer pay for his grandson’s autism treatments, he said in a steady voice in court on Thursday, before turning to the defendant and declaring, “You are a dirty, rotten scoundrel.”

Mr. Stanford took the insult in stride, and stared right back.

Then Angela Shaw Kogutt, who said three generations of her family had lost over $4 million because of Mr. Stanford’s “financial terrorism,” asked all the scores of victims in the federal court gallery to stand before Mr. Stanford to show him their faces of misery. Judge David Hittner of the Federal District Court told Mr. Stanford he was under no obligation to look, but he swiveled his chair toward the victims anyway without a flinch or sign of caring.

For Mr. Stanford, his day in court on Thursday-- the day he was sentenced to 110 years in prison without parole for masterminding a $7 billion Ponzi scheme-- was anything but a time for contrition. Instead, after refusing to testify in his own trial, Mr. Stanford broke his silence to say that unlike Bernard L. Madoff, the most prominent of Ponzi scheme swindlers, “I am not a thief.”

Rather, he said, he was the victim of government “Gestapo tactics” that provoked a run on his Caribbean bank and then sold off his assets at bargain-basement prices. Anyone who lost their money, he said, did so because of the government’s “unnecessary” actions.

“I’m not up here to ask for sympathy or forgiveness,” he said in a rambling statement to the court before the sentencing, intermittently holding back tears and shuffling papers. “I’m up here to tell you from my heart I didn’t run a Ponzi scheme.”

In response, the federal prosecutor William J. Stellmach called Mr. Stanford’s version of events “obscene.”

“This is a man utterly without remorse,” Mr. Stellmach said. “From beginning to end, he treated all of his victims as roadkill.”

A federal jury in March convicted Mr. Stanford of running an international scheme over more than two decades in which he offered fraudulent high-interest certificates of deposit at the Stanford International Bank, which was based on the Caribbean island of Antigua.

Prosecutors argued that Mr. Stanford had consistently lied to investors, promoting safe investments for money that he channeled into a luxurious lifestyle, a Swiss bank account and various business deals that almost never succeeded. Mr. Stanford’s defense lawyers pleaded for a sentence effectively of time served because of the three years he spent in prison awaiting trial. Prosecutors recommended 230 years, the maximum according to sentencing guidelines, for his convictions on 13 counts of conspiracy, wire and mail fraud, obstruction and money laundering. He was acquitted of one count of wire fraud.

The prosecutors heavily relied on James M. Davis, Mr. Stanford’s former roommate from Baylor University, who served as his chief financial officer. Mr. Davis testified that the Stanford business empire was a fraud, with bribes paid to Antiguan regulators and schemes to hide operations from federal investigators. He described how Mr. Stanford had sent him to London to send a fax to a prospective client from a bogus insurance company office to reassure him that his investment would be safe.

...[T]he prosecutors contended that while Mr. Stanford told his clients that their CDs were insured and that the money he invested went into safe financial instruments, he was actually diverting it to his own real estate and private ventures, using more than $2 billion to finance his lifestyle. As prosecutors did in the trial, Mr. Stellmach painted him as a man “who for 20 years orchestrated a massive fraudulent scheme. He corrupted everything he touched.”

Ms. Kogutt and Mr. Escalona, representing two victims’ groups, described how investors had lost their homes, retirements and ability to pay for their children’s and grandchildrens’ educations. They said some victims had become suicidal.

“Mr. Stanford’s heartless actions were coldly calculated and premeditated,” said Mr. Escalona, a Venezuelan who spoke for Latin American investors. Ms. Kogutt, who is from Dallas, said Mr. Stanford “played with our futures as if playing a board game and with our money as if it were Monopoly money. He’s just a common thief.”

It took three years to bring Mr. Stanford to trial because he was severely beaten in a 2010 fight with another federal inmate in a prison outside Houston and then became addicted to prescription antistress drugs. He underwent a year of therapy before Judge Hittner ruled that he was fit to stand trial. The defense said Mr. Stanford could not properly defend himself because he had lost much of his memory.

In an apparent appeal for a lighter sentence, Mr. Stanford said in court Thursday that he had worked hard to recover his memory, though he said it was still like “Swiss cheese.” He spoke of the “toxic mix” of drugs that he been prescribed in federal prison and the assault that led to six hours of surgery.

“This was not three years of pleasure by any stretch,” he said. “I wouldn’t wish it on anybody,” he added, not even the prosecution lawyers.

A couple dozen more billionaires behind bars and this country can get back to its ideals.

Crooked Bankster Sir Allen Stanford Indicted In $7 Billion Ponzi Scheme

"Sir" Allen Stanford of Texas, not a Mormon, just another crooked bankster

In 2008 Sir Stanford started his own PAC, The Stanford Financial Group Political Action Committee. Previously he'd been most generous to some of Congress' biggest whores-- particularly indicted criminals Tom DeLay (R-TX) and Bob Ney (R-OH). But the PAC spread the tainted cash around in a very bipartisan way. Of the $120,000 it distributed directly to members of Congress, exactly 50% went to Republicans and exactly 50% went to Democrats. The bigger the congressmember's reputation for sleaziness and corruption, the bigger the chance that they would get a nice large check from the Stanford Financial Group PAC. The half dozen most greased:

John Boehner (R-OH)- $5,000
Charlie Rangel (D-NY)- $5,000
Pete Sessions (R-TX)- $5,000
Roger Wicker (R-MS)- $5,000
Jay Rockefeller (D-WV)- $5,000
Rahm Emanuel (D-IL)- $3,000

That, of course, doesn't count how much it cost Sir Stanford to buy his knighthood from Antigua-- nor the protection that criminal enterprise/banana republic afforded him and his schemes. After he was charged in the criminal conspiracy by the U.S. government, Antigua suspended Leroy King, head of the Antigua and Barbuda Financial Services Regulatory Commission. King had been paid at least $100,000 by Stanford to permit him to run his ponzi scheme while conducting sham audits of Stanford International Bank Ltd on behalf of the notoriously crooked off shore banking haven.

In June 2005, the Securities and Exchange Commission made a secret plea to Antigua’s top banking regulator, Leroy King: help investigate whether Stanford International Bank, based in the Caribbean money haven, was engaged in a huge fraud of its investors.

But unknown to the agency, someone else had gotten to him first. R. Allen Stanford, the Texas billionaire whose bank made him a powerful figure in Antigua, had already started making a series of payments to Mr. King that would eventually top $100,000 in exchange for his help in warding off the S.E.C.

U.S. prosecutors pointed out that Stanford's business practices put the “integrity of the markets” at risk. Stanford is being held without bail since he is considered a 100% flight risk, already having been apprehended trying to escape on a chartered jet. He's been in jail in Virginia and said he was anxious to get back to Texas, a state where they know how to take care of well-connected rich white people.

“To go to Texas? Yes ma’am,” Stanford responded. Earlier, he repeatedly shook his head as the charges against him were read. He was led away in leg irons by two U.S. marshals.

Over a billion dollars of investors' money seems to have vanished without a trace although one investigator said there were "billions of dollars more in missing funds because much was wasted on a variety of risky investments, as well as cricket sponsorships, jets, yachts and other accouterments of Mr. Stanford’s lifestyle." Stanford and everyone involved, of course, claims to be innocent. We should add that before Leroy King, an American citizen, became Antigua's chief regulatory officer, he was a vice president at a less blatantly corrupt operation, Bank of America.

Don't You Just Positively HATE Having To Take Your Shoes Off At Airports?

Did the Feds seize the fancy hookers too?

It's so demeaning-- and the belts and all the other little indignities that have been flying such a drag. Glenn Greenwald doesn't paint an optimistic picture that Obama has any intention of fixing some of the Bush human right violations against the really big personal freedoms, so I have a feeling air travel will still be horrible for people like me and "Sir" Stanford. You remember him, right? Back in February Neither Ken nor I could stop writing about him. Well, yesterday "Sir" went crying to ABC News-- literally crying-- about how horrible his life has become since he was exposed as another Bernie Madoff Ponzi-operator.

The government seized his money and he now barely has a change of clothes and "was forced to fly on a commercial plane for the first time in almost two decades after the government seized his fleet of sic private jets. 'They make you take your shoes off and everything, it's terrible.'"

Poor thing! But he hasn't lost his spunk. He threatened to punch the ABC interviewer in the mouth when he asked him about charges that he had been laundering money for a Mexican drug cartel, although he did admit that the pesky government did find $3 million in drug money in his bank a few years ago. He doesn't deny it at all but bitches that it only gets in the news because he's flamboyant. His spirits are buoyed by the support he's getting from golfer V.J. Singh-- although Singh, who is sponsored by "Sir" says the support is just "at the moment."

As long as we're talking about the Feds seizing "Sir's" fleet of planes, I thought your own spirits might be buoyed, even for just a moment, to know they are also seizing the Madoff's West Palm Beach estate. Yesterday's Daily Beast had a soap-opera's worth of the tribulations of Ruth Madoff-- tribulations now; trial will come later. But picture this on afternoon cable:

As Ruth Madoff swept into Palm Beach last month with a quintet of girlfriends, her $7,500 Birkin bag dangling, her husband’s 74-year-old sister, who was ruined by Bernie’s scam, was watering plants and driving people to the airport just to make ends meet.

Sondra Wiener, forced to make pocket money like an out-of-work laborer, endures the pity of her neighbors. After her brother's scheme collapsed, she also put her home in a gated community outside Palm Beach up for sale. Her brother mailed her and other family members Cartier, Tiffany, and other expensive jewelry in December (which violated a court order and were repossessed), but sources say they do not think her sister-in-law Ruth has given her money. And Ruth is believed to have plenty, even now. Although authorities have seized her property and bank accounts—most recently the Palm Beach home and the antique yacht restored by Bernie—investigators describe caches of laundered funds hidden around the world in Ruth’s name.

...The name Madoff inspires an eerie silence. In particular, the very mention of Ruth seems to arouse fear. Those few who knew her well won't talk about her, those who knew her less well will only talk anonymously.

“Everyone down here thinks she was involved in the Ponzi scheme," said a leading socialite in Palm Beach. "She and Bernie were always collaborators. Look, let me tell you what happened to my friend. Her husband wouldn’t let her invest with the Madoffs. Then after her husband died, Bernie wasn’t taking any new investors. She talked to Ruth who said give Bernie a call and she told him 'Ruth knows what this is all about' and Bernie simply said 'OK, I'll take your investment.' And this woman gave him the store and rued the day she had met Ruth Madoff."

The Incredible Santelli-- And Why Republicans Think American Working Families Are "Losers"

Wall Street is mad as hell and they refuse to be abused by what the Republicans refer to as "the losers." In their parlance "the losers" are not the failed banksters and insurance companies and CEOs but their victims, ordinary working families. Last night John Stewart took a look at how Santelli's network, CNBC, mislead its viewers so badly than anyone who would have taken them seriously and followed their advice would absolutely be in need of a bailout. It's an eight-and-half minute study on how the business press acted as cheerleaders while the financial system melted down. It is completely worth watching.

And it dovetails nicely with a disturbing report in this morning's NY Times:

More than a dozen Wall Street trading firms systematically cheated their customers of millions of dollars by improperly slicing bits of profit from countless trades, federal regulators said on Wednesday.

In China they would have been sentenced to death for this kind of fraud-- and then pardoned-- but here they got a $69 million fine-- without even having to admit guilt! This could never have happened had not Bush, the Republicans and the Blue Dog type Democrats they are allied with not systematically wrecked the regulatory system meant to protect society from greed-obsessed amoral predators. (I hope you read our report on the nexus between Wall Street and Washington earlier today.) Anyway, John Stewart... take it away:

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

CNBC Gives Financial Advice

*****UPDATE: BARNEY WANTS JUSTICE-- BANKSTERS SHOULD GO TO PRISON

They stole far more than millions of dollars. They robbed the whole country blind-- enabled by the Bush Family, the Republican Party and crooked Blue Dogs. Barney Frank called for legal authorities to start looking into bringing criminal indictments against banksters who helped cause the current crisis. "Rules don't work if people have no fear of them."

Do New Orleanians have to put up with the bullying of the Party of No? (Maybe not.) PLUS: Sir Sleazebag found!

When he defeated indicted Louisiana Rep. William Jefferson, Donklephant asked, "Is Anh Cao A Model For A New Republican Party?"

Donklephant blogger Justin Gardner wrote:

No doubt many GOPers will call Cao a RINO if he doesn’t toe the party line, but this is the type of guy who can bring independents and moderate Dems back into the Republican party. And I hope Obama finds an ally in Cao from time to time when they’re trying to solve difficult problems that require common sense solutions over partisan jockeying.

Fingers crossed.

Well, it doesn't appear to be working out that way. Howie writes:

When it looked like a few House Repugs might break ranks with their party's obstructionist leaders, I mentioned that Anh Cao, the Repug from New Orleans, was most likely to vote yes -- since he said he would for the good of his constituents. Then House Repug Whip Eric Cantor got a-hold of him and persuaded him that there are some goods that are gooder than his constituents'.

Now BayouBuzz reports:

Louisiana Congressman Cao Faces Recall Petition Over Stimulus Vote

Congressman Joseph “Anh” Cao, a Republican, who defeated William “Bill” Jefferson, is facing a recall petition because of his vote on the Barack Obama stimulus package. The recall has been initiated by a group of ministers.

Cao had indicated that he would be voting in favor of the controversial legislation but instead voted against it.

Papers have been filed with the Office of the Louisiana Secretary of State which started the process, requiring sufficient signatures to force a recall election for the office held by Representative Cao.

Cao represents a majority African American community, many who were outraged by Cao’s vote. Cao made national news with his victory over Bill Jefferson.

One elected official, State Representative Juan A. LaFonta, Democrat of District 96, told Bayoubuzz that he does not know about the existence of the petition but that he would sign it.

“We don’t need Cao to be Steve Scalise”, said LaFonta. Scalise is a Republican who represents a neighboring conservative Congressional District. “People are starving and Cao needs to represent the people of the district”, LaFonta said.

Cao is Vietnamese and has been hailed by many in the media as a new face of the Republican Party.

The group of ministers who filed the petition want to make sure that he faces a recall, which could be a very daunting act, if not impossible act, in Louisiana based upon the state’s history.

HOWIE ADDS:

I hope Anh Cao gets recalled, not just because he's a Republican but because he put his obstructionist party's wishes ahead of the interests of his own constituents and ahead of the interests of the United States. Today's NY Times focuses on GOP hypocrisy around the country as more and more Republican members of Congress who, like Cao, voted to obstruct, are now celebrating the parts of the Stimulus Bill they like. Take Michigan's Twittering idiot Pete Hoekstra for example -- who doesn't seem to understand Twitter at all and who gave away state secrets on it a few weeks ago:

Representative Peter Hoekstra of Michigan sounded almost giddy on Wednesday in a post on the microblogging Web site Twitter: "If you know of someone thinking of buying first home, now may be the time. Stimulus incentive is very generous! Up to 8k! Check it out."

Mr. Hoekstra, who also voted against the bill, appeared less optimistic last week. "House passed spending bill. I don’t believe it will work," Mr. Hoekstra wrote on Twitter. "Hope we’re wrong but I don’t think so."

BULLETIN: BILLIONAIRE SIR SLEAZEBAG FOUND!

The Washington Post reports today:

Allen Stanford Found in Virginia

FBI agents found R. Allen Stanford, the suspected mastermind of a $9.2 billion financial fraud, in Fredericksburg, Va., and served him with court papers, authorities said.

The Securities and Exchange Commission charged Stanford, his three companies and two associates with fraud Tuesday after determining that he was allegedly misleading customers in the sale of certificates of deposit and other financial products.

Federal agents raided his office buildings in Houston, a judge froze his assets and a receiver was put in charge of his companies. But Stanford, a billionaire who spends much of the year in Antigua, where the bank at the center of the alleged fraud is based, could not be found.

The lawyer representing him in the SEC investigation had weeks earlier ended his association with Stanford and disavowed any earlier statements.

The investigation into Stanford has focused on what the SEC has called "impossible" returns on his investment portfolio, generating questions about whether he was running a Ponzi scheme.

The SEC has worked with criminal authorities on the case, but no criminal charges have yet been filed against Stanford. The SEC often files civil charges before criminal charges are filed.

But remember, since "Sir Allen" isn't under any kind of criminal indictment, he wasn't arrested. He was merely served the papers. Apparently he did surrender his passport (though if he can make his way to, say, Antigua, of which he more or less owns a chunk, it doesn't seem likely that he'll be turned away for want of a passport), but then he was and sent on his way.

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Have you seen SEC-cited billionaire sleazebag "Sir Allen" Stanford? With UPDATE: Sir Sleazebag's political investments have served him well before

Have you seen this man? If so . . . well, actually,
the authorities don't seem all that interested.

by Ken

In case you didn't catch it, Howie added an update to yesterday's account of the charges by the SEC that billionaire sleazebag "Sir Allen" Stanford -- he claims to have picked up some sort of knighthood in Antigua -- had swindled investors out of who-knows-how-much out of some $8 billion worth of highly questionable CDs he sold. In that update, which I've reprinted below, he sets out the details of our Sir's apparent escape-to-Antigua attempt via a rented private plane.

And sure enough, earlier today Bloomberg reported:

U.S. regulators don’t know the whereabouts of R. Allen Stanford, the billionaire accused of running a “massive, ongoing fraud” through his Houston-based Stanford Group Co., a Securities and Exchange Commission official said.

“We don’t know where he is, quite frankly,” said Rose Romero, director of the SEC’s office in Fort Worth, Texas.

Bloomberg also reported that Sir Allen "has six planes registered with the Federal Aviation Administration, according to the agency’s Web site," and that "Alfredo Perez, a spokesman for the U.S. Marshall’s office in Houston, which yesterday raided the company’s offices there, said he isn’t aware of any arrest warrant for Stanford." (The SEC's action was limited to filing a civil suit, though Bloomberg reported, "A federal judge in Dallas agreed to freeze assets and appoint a receiver to account for the roughly $8 billion investors spent on the CDs, according to the SEC.")

In his update, Howie also had some pointed questions regarding some of Sir Allen's famous connections. Here it is again:

WHAT, STILL NO ANKLE BRACELET?

CNBC reported this morning that "Sir" Allen tried to flee the U.S. on a private plane. Apparently he's desperate to reach the banana republic he owns a healthy chunk of but was foiled, neglecting to have sent a wire transfer to rent the getaway plane. He called them at 3pm and said he had to leave by 6pm for Antigua.

Does anyone know if Chuck Schumer and the other politicians who have aided and abetted Stanford in his offshore banking shenanigans have been asked about returning any of the million plus dollars he gave them as legalized bribes over the years? And since the SEC now says they don't know Stanford's whereabouts, I'm wondering if the FBI is on this. Or have his political connections given the word that he's allowed to escape?

UPDATE: SIR SLEAZEBAG'S INVESTMENTS IN
POLITICS HAVE SERVED HIM WELL IN THE PAST

Looks like "Sir" Allen has been in trouble before-- but always got away with his crooked business practices. I guess if you hand out enough hundreds of thousands of dollars to enough political hacks on both sides of the aisle, you buy yourself plenty of protection. I just can't understand why no one is asking the politicians to turnover their share of the loot Stanford has stolen and given them.

Years before the Stanford Group was accused in a worldwide fraud, American financial regulators found significant securities violations at the company that some experts say were telltale signs of deeper problems. But each time the regulators ultimately let the company off with relatively small fines, records show.

On Tuesday, the Securities and Exchange Commission said Stanford might have engaged in an $8 billion fraud involving high-yielding certificates of deposit held in the company's bank in Antigua. It was run by Robert Allen Stanford, a businessman who enjoyed political connections in Antigua and in Washington, where his company lobbied extensively.

Experts said that the earlier violations amounted to a series of red flags of deeper problems. Officials at the S.E.C. said Wednesday that they were reviewing the regulatory history of Stanford, and whether the agency-- often accused of lax enforcement-- should have been more vigilant in this case.

...For years, Mr. Stanford and entities associated with him have been raining money on Congress, through campaign donations, trips and conferences in resort destinations. There is no evidence that this influenced the way regulators handled the company.

But since 2000, Mr. Stanford and his firm, along with its employees and its political action committee, have given $2.4 million in campaign contributions, according to the Center for Responsive Politics-- about two-thirds to Democrats. Top recipients, the center said, included Senator Bill Nelson, Democrat of Florida, $45,900; and Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, $28,150.

Campaign finance records also show that in 2008 Mr. Stanford gave at least $28,000 to committees controlled by Representative Charles B. Rangel, Democrat of New York. Mr. Rangel has been an outspoken champion of legislation benefiting the economic interests of Caribbean countries and residents.

Mr. Stanford and entities associated with him have also courted lawmakers with trips. For example, the Stanford Group took Senator John Cornyn, Republican of Texas, and his wife on a three-day trip to Antigua and Barbuda for a "financial services industry fact-finding mission" shortly after the 2004 election, according to data compiled by LegiStorm, which tracks Congressional ethics disclosures.

The Times goes on to report that Sir Sleazebag "never had any specific legislative requests." And I'm sure it was just a coincidence that so much of the millions he slipped to politicians-- much of it apparently from drug laundering profits-- went to the good folks working on legislation dealing with his favorite subject: offshore banking regulations. I'm sure he's just interested in that in a kind of general, non-specific sense, of course... like in an academic way. Charlie Rangel? Now where have I heard that name before? -- Howie

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Breaking news (by way of Mexico): Billionaire sleazebag "Sir Allen" Stanford charged with fraud by the SEC

"Sir Allen" and his, er, group

by Ken

Howie has found his way to a connected computer long enough to pass on a bit of breaking news, with this note:

I wrote about this crook a few days ago. He{s like a posterboy for why we should have public financing of electoral politics. He was writing mammoth checks to corrupt Republicans and Democrats -- especially the ones dealing with writing offshore banking rules -- on the same fucking days.

Here's the start of what he wrote Friday:

Crooked Billionaire Pays Off Crooked Politicians -- Steals Billions?

Flamboyant Houston billionaire R. Allen Stanford and his Stanford Financial Group are under investigation. I doubt he'll break a sweat. Mr. Sir Stanford (he was knighted by Antigua in 2006 and has gone by the name Sir Allen Stanford ever since) has prison insurance -- and lots of it. OK, he may not have the big prison-proof names that members of Congress like Jerry Lewis or Duncan Hunter or Tom DeLay have, but he has something just as good: cash. And he has spread it around. I'll get to that in a second.

Now the breaking news, from the Washington Post:

SEC Charges Stanford Financial in $8B Fraud

By Zachary A. Goldfarb
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, February 17, 2009; 1:12 PM

The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged a prominent Texas businessman and three of his companies with an $8 billion fraud in the sale of certificates of deposit. The case appears to mark one of the largest alleged frauds by a money manager in U.S. history.

Robert Allen Stanford and his companies sold $8 billion of CDs -- guaranteed fixed-income investment products -- to investors by "promising improbable and unsubstantiated high interest rates," the SEC said in a statement. The agency named in its complaint Stanford International Bank Ltd., based in Antigua, and related firms based in Houston.

The SEC said the firms falsely claimed that their deposits were safe, that more than 20 analysts monitor the investments, and that yearly audits were being conducted.

In addition, one of Stanford's companies falsely told customers that it was not exposed to the $50 billion Ponzi scheme allegedly orchestrated by Bernard L. Madoff, the SEC said.

A federal judge in North Texas, where the case was filed, has frozen Stanford's assets. The SEC said Stanford had not cooperated and that it is still investigating the alleged fraud.

UPDATE (FROM MEXICO): WHAT, STILL NO ANKLE BRACELET?

CNBC reported this morning that "Sir" Allen tried to flee the U.S. on a private plane. Apparently he's desperate to reach the banana republic he owns a healthy chunk of but was foiled, neglecting to have sent a wire transfer to rent the getaway plane. He called them at 3pm and said he had to leave by 6pm for Antigua.

Does anyone know if Chuck Schumer and the other politicians who have aided and abetted Stanford in his offshore banking shenanigans have been asked about returning any of the million plus dollars he gave them as legalized bribes over the years? And since the SEC now says they don't know Stanford's whereabouts, I'm wondering if the FBI is on this. Or have his political connections given the word that he's allowed to escape? -- Howie

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Crooked Billionaire Pays Off Crooked Politicians-- Steals Billions?

Sir Allen Stanford (Texas), second from left, under investigation

Flamboyant Houston billionaire R. Allen Stanford and his Stanford Financial Group are under investigation. I doubt he'll break a sweat. Mr. Sir Stanford (he was knighted by Antigua in 2006 and has gone by the name Sir Allen Stanford ever since) has prison insurance-- and lots of it. OK, he may not have the big prison-proof names that members of Congress, like Jerry Lewis or Duncan Hunter or Tom DeLay have, but he has something just as good: cash. And he has spread it around. I'll get to that in a second.

I imagine that it's remotely possible that there may be honest people with offshore banking business-- but it doesn't look like Stanford was one of them. Of course, if you think that Bernie Madoff was just an innocent hard-working businessman, you might feel the same way about Mr. Stanford and what appears to be his own little ponzi scheme-- one that rewarded his clients with between 10.3 and 15.1% very year between 1995 and 2008. That would be next to impossible for a passive investment for over a decade. He uses an Antiguan auditor-- which doesn't make him a bad man, but probably confirms that he is.

So what about this prison insurance that is sure to keep him free as a bird even in the face of a federal investigation? You've heard of those crooked businessmen who pay protection to crooked politicians on both sides of the aisle so they can get away with murder. R. Allen Stanford may not be a murderer but for the kind of bribes he pays out to politicians he gets away with murder.

Leaving the wife, Susan, out of this and just looking at Allen's "donations"... well, they're pretty eye-popping-- and I bet no one is running to return them. I guess now that Bob Ney (R-OH) is out of prison himself, he could pay back the $4,200 Stanford gave him in 2005. And Charlie Rangel (D-NY) could return the $2,300 he got from Stanford last year... before he winds up in prison himself (on unrelated corruption charges). So could John Cornyn (R-TX), Phil Gramm (R-TX), Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Max Baucus (D-MT), Tom DeLay (R-TX), Pete Sessions (R-TX), Richard Shelby (R-AL), Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and plenty of other legislators and upholders of public decency from both sides of the aisle. But let's look at the big bucks, not these regulated $2,000 pops.

DCCC- $20,000- February 2000
Americans For A Republican Majority PAC- $5,000- May 2000
RNC- $100,000- June 2000
DSCC- $15,000- June 2000
DSCC- $5,000- July 2000
DSCC- $10,000- July 2000
RNC- $3,500- July 2000
NRSC- $20,000- August 2000
NRSC- $20,000- August 2000
DCCC- $5,000- August 2000
DSCC- $10,000- September 2000
DSCC- $10,000- December 2000
DCCC- $10,000- March 2001
DSCC- $12,500- March 2001
DSCC- $12,500- March 2001
NRCC- $25,000- April 2001
DCCC- $10,000- May 2001
NRSC- $20,000- June 2001
NRSC- $20,000- June 2001
DSCC- $25,000- June 2001
DCCC- $20,000- October 2001
DSCC- $50,000- December 2001
DSCC- $100,000- March 2002
NRCC- $25,000- March 2002
DCCC- $50,000- March 2002
DSCC- $100,000- August 2002
DCCC- $25,000- September 2002
DSCC- $250,000- October 2002
NRCC- $100,000- October 2002
DSCC- $250,000- November 2002
DSCC- $50,000- November 2002
DCCC- $50,000- October 2002
NRCC- $50,000- November 2002
DCCC- $10,000- May 2003
DSCC- $10,000- June 2003
RNC- $25,000- March 2004
DSCC- $10,000- June 2004
NRCC- $5,000- September 2004
NRCC- $5,000- April 2005
DSCC- $25,000- July 2005
NRCC- $28,500- May 2008

That's almost a million and a half dollars in "donations" to the big Inside-the-Beltway corrupt political machines. He gave thousands more but I got bored transcribing them all and I figured you've probably gotten the picture by now. Today's NY Times pointed out that the crooked politicians who took his bribes were mostly involved with working on offshore banking regulations and reminds readers that this isn't the first time Sir Allen has been in trouble with the Feds, even beyond Stanford falsely claiming to be a descendent of California Governor (and Stanford University founder) Leland Stanford.

Stanford, a diversified financial firm that offers a broad array of services, including investment banking and research, holds about $8 billion in deposits at its bank and has about $50 billion in assets in its wealth management affiliate, according to its spokesman.

However, a wrongful-termination suit filed in a state court in Texas last summer alleges the asset sizes may have been inflated. The two former Stanford brokers who filed the suit said they had left the firm amid fears they could be implicated in the various “unethical and illegal business practices” they claim to have witnessed.

In their suit, they claim Stanford overstated the asset value of individuals in order to mislead potential investors, failed to file mandatory forms disclosing its clients’ offshore accounts, and purged electronic data from its computers in response to an S.E.C. investigation.