Investor with Madoff says life is 'destroyed'

NEWARK, N.J. - A week ago, Roger Peskin was a retired multimillionaire living the good life with his wife and two children in Bethlehem, Pa.

Now, the 65-year-old says he has been ruined because he entrusted his life savings to disgraced Wall Street money manager Bernard L. Madoff, who was arrested Dec. 11 on securities-fraud charges.

Peskin said he and his wife were now looking for work and pondering the possibility of pulling their children, ages 9 and 12, from private school after losing more than $3 million.

"I was retired," Peskin said. "Now I have to think about going back to work at the age of 65, in the middle of a recession."

Peskin, a retired specialty magazine publisher and former New Jersey resident, sold his home in Milford, Hunterdon County, three weeks ago. He invested the proceeds from the sale with Madoff, too.

Peskin described himself as a conservative investor and said he was attracted to Madoff because he was told that Madoff's practices reflected his own investment philosophy. Peskin estimated that he had 95 percent of his savings invested with Madoff.

"I can only take so much, and this is the end of everything I've built up the past 35 years," he said. "My life is destroyed - my kids' lives are destroyed."