Last week the complete list of Bernie Madoff’s “victims” was released by the courts.  And low and behold, the Chelsea Hotel’s own Marlene Krauss, Chair of our board of directors, was featured in its pages, with not one, but two listings.  Unfortunately, the document doesn’t reveal the amount of money she “invested,” though maybe that will come to light at a future time.We’re sure that the IMG_2432 money is from her own personal fund rather than that of the investors in her heath care venture capitalist firms (KBL Healthcare Corp III and KBL IV), as such would, we understand, not be quite kosher.  Though the temptation might have existed to put the KBL money in what appeared to be a higher-yield fund such as Madoff’s, we’re sure Marlene would want to do the right thing and put the approximately $350 million into a more secure fund such as treasury bonds. But what she worry?  With room rates at the Chelsea Hotel slashed to $89/night for even the most expensive suites, she’s sure to make her money back in no time.  Expressions of sympathy should take the form of personal checks, money orders, loose change, S&H Green Stamps or gently used coats, and can be sent to Mistress Marlene at her POB Box or dropped in the convenient repository at the Chelsea’s front desk.  — Ed Hamilton

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23 responses to “Marlene Krauss, Harvard MBA, Falls for Ponzi Scheme”

  1. Salvation Smarmy Avatar
    Salvation Smarmy

    “Gently used coats…” Mwaaaahhhaahaaa. If only the lady didn’t live on Manhattan’s richest block she could don that volunteered shmata and not have rotten eggs thrown at her in the street by her blueblood neighbors.

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  2. Madoff Shmaydoff Avatar
    Madoff Shmaydoff

    This is jaw dropping news. Thanks for brinings us this. Maybe now Marlene will see the wisdom of sound management. However I object to the characterization in the titled that Marlene “Fell For” this Ponzi scheme.
    Everyone knows, or should know, that Ponzi schemes prey upon, first and foremost, the abject greed of those who join in. Without the joiners, the scheme goes nowhere. They see easy money and spring into action, recruiting other victims (friends, family) to line their own pockets in bonus dividends.
    Marlene didn’t “fall for” anything. Her greed led her headlong into confederacy with someone just as greedy, Bernie Madoff.
    She accuses Stanley Bard and Family of poor recordkeeping, even theft, but she is a Harvard MBA and she didn’t demand to see Bernard Madoff’s spreadsheets? If she had, she’d have seen the same impossible facts and figures that the whistleblower testifying in Congress had seen, and shied away. But she didn’t. Her greed led her to forget everything she was supposed to retain at Harvard.
    Greed never wins. It will never win. This is the proof AND the pudding. Open wide.

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  3.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Couldn’t help but notice Stanley Bards’s name isn’t on the list, and Madoff is a neighbor of both Stanley and Marlene, so I would be shocked if Bernie hadn’t gone door-to-door with his sure-fire investment portfolio.
    Wise man, Stanley, knows that the point is to keep what you’ve got. Marlene should make inquiries as to whether he’s presently employed and if not, snatch him off the market.

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  4. Hold The Sauerkrauss Avatar
    Hold The Sauerkrauss

    As a businesswoman she’s all hot dog, no mustard

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  5. Where's Piri's Money? Avatar
    Where’s Piri’s Money?

    Is David Dubois Elder on the list? Maybe when Marlene led him blindly into this Chelsea takeover fiasco, she also introduced him to a money manager named Madoff. In addition to all the money they wrongly assumed they’d make together, Elder probably needed someplace to stash the 1.2 million in Hotel profits that the courts in CA say he illegally diverted from his own stepfather Piri Thomas, author of ‘Down These Mean Streets’. For shame. I’d lay bets that Piri would rather see Madoff make off with the money than ingrate Elder.

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  6.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    If she was dumb enough to invest the healthcare company’s money, she could be forced to sell her stake in the Chelsea. Wait, didn’t she abruptly resign from the board of that company a few months back? I seem to remember a piece on the blog about it

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  7.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    a couple of the bag ladies in marlene’s neighborhood make six figures a year just panhandling. so she has options.

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  8.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    That was Summer Infant, the company that her previous SPAC, KBL Healthcare II, bought. That’s an interesting story too by the way — Marlene cashed out the majority of her stock at $4.50 for over a million bucks, meanwhile her investors are left holding the shit at $2. Thanks, Marlene.

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  9. Old & Crappy Avatar
    Old & Crappy

    It just makes you wonder what kind of shell game she’s playing with the Chelsea.

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  10. Hold 'EM & Fold'EM Avatar
    Hold ‘EM & Fold’EM

    Marlene Krauss is gamblin with the lives of the residents of the Chelsea Hotel by refusing to hire a new manager.

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  11.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    It’ll soon come out how much Ms. Krauss lost. Its a criminal case after all and every penny is evidence againt Bernie. The Madoff Fund probably had a minimum buy-in and it surely wasn’t a small amount.

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  12. GREEDMONGER Avatar
    GREEDMONGER

    G otta
    R egret
    E ver
    E victing
    D evoted
    M anagement
    O f
    N ew Yorks
    G reatest
    E ccentric
    R est Stop

    Like

  13. The Ghosts Avatar
    The Ghosts

    Greed kills. Greed is what got her into Madoff’s scheme, and greed is ewhat motivated her and the shiftless David Elder to take over a hotel they cared not a whit about otherwise.

    Like

  14.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Its not easy to feel empathy for the lady. Sorry to hear she got taken, but I won’t shed crocodile tears, not after what she pulled on the Bards. Bernie may have impacted Marlenes life and her husbands, but her tricks and schemes have affected many lives.

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  15. Poor Little Rich Girl? Avatar
    Poor Little Rich Girl?

    Marlene Krauss sure is taking her lumps this past 18 months.
    It began with her driving her most valuable asset, the Chelsea Hotel, toward financial disaster with a procession of wildly unpopular, unqualified, uninspired managers; then the housing market goes in the crapper, and now she lost an untold fortune to the Madoff Fund?
    If thats not Karma I just don’t know what is. I think we’re seeing it first-hand.

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  16. easy target Avatar
    easy target

    Love to one day look at the spreadsheet for the Chelsea and the enormous costs to the hotel in legals, management, security guards and the unnecessary losses in rental units that now sit empty.
    Stanley ran a tight ship and did not look for these ‘get rich quick’ schemes that seem to entice Marlene.
    Maybe now is a good time to sell off her minority share? Please MK– check your vicious ass out of the Chelsea!

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  17.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    People like this get what they deserve.

    Like

  18. 72nd Street Blues Avatar
    72nd Street Blues

    I am positively PANTING for an update on how much cold hard cash Marlene lost to Madoff and his co-conspirators. I too think it will eventually come out, every titilating little detail, as she fumbles to recover a fraction of whats lost.
    But whats lost is lost, Marlene. Don’t you know that?
    I’m entranced by how poetic the Justice can be at the Hotel Chelsea.

    Like

  19.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Marlene sure does live on a nice block! I was there last night, not at her place of course but a couple doors down. She’ll probably have to move now, and I’ll bet it won’t be into the penthouse with Bernie!

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  20.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Damn, Marlene, if you were just giving your money away I wish you’d have called. I could use it, Andrew Tilley is/was suing me for a week’s rent!

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  21. Don't Get Made, Get Madoff Avatar
    Don’t Get Made, Get Madoff

    All you had to do was ask for his spreadsheet stoopid.
    Easy come, easy go.

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  22. Where's Piri's Money? Avatar

    QUACK QUACK
    If Bernie has Marlene’s money,
    how will I have tenants attacked?

    Like

  23. Poison Ivy League Avatar
    Poison Ivy League

    See any-one can get into Harvard Business School, its not like Harvard regular where only future scholars need apply. At Harvard Business all you gotta do is cut the tuition check.

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