Bernie Madoff asks Trump to reduce his prison sentence

Bernie Madoff, who oversaw the largest Ponzi scheme in U.S. history, has filed a request with the Justice Department for President Trump to reduce his prison sentence. 

Madoff, 81, is serving 150 years in a federal prison in Butner, N.C., for orchestrating the financial fraud, which conned investors in his firm Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities out of almost $65 billion. 

{mosads}Madoff, who pleaded guilty in 2009, is not seeking a pardon but instead requesting a sentence commutation. The Justice Department’s website lists the request as “pending.”

The Justice Department declined to comment to The Hill regarding the request’s timing, but told CNBC, which was the first to report the news, that a clemency application could take between one to three months to appear on the web site. 

Annette Bongiorno, Madoff’s former longtime secretary who is serving a six-year sentence for helping organize the scheme, is also requesting a commutation, according to the Justice Department’s website. She has served nearly 4 1/2 years of her prison sentence, though a federal judge rejected her request in January to be released to home confinement. 

The president has granted 10 pardons and four commutations during his term so far.