Relief, but little closure, for Madoff victims

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Norma Hill said Bernard Madoff looked just like he did 21 years ago, when he comforted her after her husband's death.

"He put his arm around me and he assured me my life would be fine," Hill said, speaking outside the courthouse in lower Manhattan where Madoff had just been sentenced to 150 years in prison.

Hill's husband had invested his savings with the financier two weeks before his death. She learned the money was gone after Madoff was arrested in December for running a multibillion-dollar "Ponzi scheme."

Hill, who was in court to see Madoff sentenced on Monday, said she didn't feel any closure after the penalty was imposed.

"I felt that it was the beginning," she said, noting that Madoff's victims would now have to deal with the difficulties of recovering their investments.

Madoff investors expressed relief after the confessed swindler was sentenced but said they would only feel closure if they got their money back and if any co-conspirators were brought to justice.

"I'm not looking for anything" from the sentencing, said another victim, Miriam Seigman. "The sentence should be a change in the system, so that this will never happen again, and I don't see that happening."

Seigman and others expressed anger with U.S. regulators and the Securities Investor Protection Corp (SIPC) for failing to recover or pay back money lost through Madoff's scam, in which investors were paid returns from money paid by later investors. The SIPC maintains a fund to help investors who have accounts at failed brokerage firms.

Many Madoff victims spoke at a rally near the courthouse held to call attention to their difficulties in recovering their money.

"I feel greatly relieved that justice has been done for Mr Madoff. He was sentenced for life, but we victims are also enduring a life sentence," said Maureen Ebel, 61, who lost her life savings and retirement fund in the scam.

Ebel said Madoff's in-court apology was not sincere.

"You can't commit a crime for decades and then get caught and then say you are sorry. He has no remorse," she said.

Ron Weinstein, whose wife knew Madoff socially, said he would be happy to get back 20 percent of his investment, "because right now I have zero."

He said he and his wife were forced to sell their Manhattan apartment and move into a smaller rental. But he wasn't looking for closure from the sentencing.

"He stole my money. I'm not going to let him steal my life. I'm still going to go on, I'm still going to survive and I'm still going to enjoy my life."

Irwin Cantor, who invested with Madoff after persuading a friend to introduce him to the financier, said the sentence meant nothing and complained that there have not been more arrests in the case.

"It would take an IQ of negative 3 to believe it was a one-man operation," he said.

Still, the 81-year-old Cantor had one remaining wish for Madoff.

"He (swindled) a lot of Jewish people," Cantor said. "In the Jewish language, there is a blessing ... which means he should live to be 120. May he do so."

All those years would be spent in prison.

(Additional reporting by Christine Kearney, Franz Strasser, Vikram Subhedar and Chavon Sutton; editing by John Wallace)