While the civil and criminal lawsuits alleging fraud and negligence are starting to trickle in for the Fairfield Greenwich Group (FGG), the legal jury is still out as to how culpable they are in regards to the $7.5 billion dollars the group lost with Bernard Maddoff.  But for FGG co-founder Walter Noel and his jet setting socialite clan of daughters (Marisa Noel Brown, etc.) and son-in-law salesmen (Andres Piedrahita, Philip Toub, etc.), the “social” jury is in, and it is a resounding guilty as charged. In April, many “friends” anonymously took snipes at them in the Vanity Fair article Greenwich Mean Time.  Now the Round Hill Club of Greenwich, CT has asked them not to return (aka revoked their membership).  A tipster notes:

The Round Hill Club recently revoked the Noel family membership.  After all of the heat they have drawn and the publicity nightmare, it looks like they [the club members] have had enough…

More»

[Miami-Dade County Criminal Court Record for Samuel Piedrahita.  Click to enlarge]

Back in February, we did a post on Fairfield Greenwich Group jet-set salesman Andres Piedrahita’s previous investment track record, which was anything but stellar.  Piedrahita is a son-in-law of FGG’s co-founder Walter Noel (and brother-in-law of socialite Marisa Noel Brown), and despite failures in the past was able to fail upward to “success” at FGG selling Bernard Madoff products to investors around the world.

Today we received a comment tip on Piedrahita’s father Samuel’s past criminal record in Miami.

Andres piedrahita’s father Samuel–fled the american justice system.He killed a man in miami driving under the influence of alcohol and fled to colombia.  You can bet that like father like son

More»

It’s becoming more clear that Fairfield Greenwich Group (FGG), not only didn’t do due dilligence on Madoff when they lost $7.5 billion, but their salesmen (i.e. Founder Walter Noel’s son-in-laws) weren’t vetted all that well either.  Last week a tipster told us of son-in-law Andrés Piedrahíta failing upward to partner at FGG.

And today a tipster tells us of Philip Toub, another one of Noel’s sons-in-law, and the firm’s agent with the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority investors.  He was a partner in Fairfield Greenwich Group, and is married to Alix Noel. He’s also an ex-bartender.  Below a photo of his “glory days” at a “Pimps and Hos” party. John Flanagan (a “big party promoter” according to our tipster) is standing next to him.

Phil, as I’m sure you know, was a bartender before becoming a full partner of FGG. Attached is a picture from those days, from a “Pimps and Ho’s” party. Next to him is John Flanagan, a big party promoter.

I wish to remain anonymous.

UPDATE: Another tipster writes…

and an ex-valet parker in LA whilst he was trying to “act”. married alix and was quickly set up in family biz.

[Noel Family Xmas card 2005, Photo via Daily Intel]

No Christmas season is complete without tree lights on Park Avenue, an enormous tree in Rockefeller Center, and of course a Noel Family Christmas card that boasts a tanned extended international family with tons and tons of smallfries.  But this year, although Walter and Monica didn’t opt out of the parties (though not entirely without objections), they did break a multiple decades long tradition of family Christmas cards. It must have seemed only appropriate after Noel’s Fairfield Greenwich Group’s $7.5 billion Madoff losses.   A tipster notes:

We are well into January, and there is no Noel Family Christmas card to speak of.  I have gotten these things from Walter and Monica like clockwork for the past 15 years, often dreading in some ways how they would still look young, skinny, tanned, and act as a foil to my aged self.

A projection of what the 2008 Christmas card may have looked like after the jump…

More»

Generally speaking, one of the biggest issues for people hit with the recession is recalibrating their spending habits and tightening their belts so-to-speak.  Sure most people’s holdings and 401k’s have plunged, but that’s easy to ignore, just don’t look at it.  But what we are undoubtedly forced to confront is that Prada bag we want and can’t get, or that new flat screen tv, or in some more “social” cases that gala event we want to attend.  Yes, resetting one’s social calendar is in many times necessary, in some just prudent.

Enter Walter Noel, who recently came under fire when his company Fairfield Greenwich Group lost $7.5 billion of his investors money in their faux fund that invested exclusively with Bernard Madoff. It’s unclear yet where Noel stands with respect to repercussions both legally and financially, but socially he seems to be bouncing back at least for the moment.  A tipster writes: More»