Needless to say, over the winter, a subtle media-driven "the-economy-is-to-blame" thread became apparent in the stories about the rash of murder-suicide incidents.
Additionally, there is a growing list of "celebrity suicides" of wealthy and well-connected individuals who have allegedly died by their own hand. Here are the ones that appear to be on that exclusive tally, to date.
April 22, 2009 - David Kellermann, 41, the acting chief financial officer of Freddie Mac, died by hanging. See more details, here.
January 5, 2009 - Steven L. Good, 52, Chairman and Chief Executive of Sheldon Good & Co., a leading US real estate auction firm, was found with a gunshot to the head, behind the wheel of his red Jaguar. The car was in a parking lot in the McGraw Wildlife Refuge near East Dundee, Kane County, outside of Chicago. No suicide note was found with the body, but authorities felt it was suicide.
Good, who was Chairman of the US Realtors' Commercial Alliance Committee, had a long-standing business relationship with Donald Trump. Good's father founded the real estate company in 1965. The firm "has sold more than 45,000 U.S. and international properties in more than 100 different classes and produced more than $10 billion in sales.”
January 5, 2009 - Adolf Merckle, 71, the billionaire investor, businessman, and one of the richest people in Germany lost a fortune shorting Volkswagen. He died by throwing himself in front of a train near his hometown of Blaubeuren. He developed his Bohemian grandfather's chemical wholesale company into Germany's largest pharmaceutical wholesaler, Phoenix Pharmahandel. The explanation for his death centered on reports that his cement company HeidelbergCement was unable to make payments on a huge loan taken out to purchase an English competitor.
December 23, 2008 - René-Thierry Magon de la Villehuchet, 67, a French nobleman, money manager, and businessman, and one of the founders of Access International Advisors (AIA Group), had funneled $1.4 billion of his clients' money into the fund run by Bernie Madoff.
De la Villehuchet was found dead in his company office on Madison Avenue in New York City. His left wrist was slit and de la Villehuchet had taken sleeping pills, in what appeared to be a suicide. Although no suicide note was found at the scene, his brother in France received a note shortly after his death in which he expressed remorse and a feeling of responsibility.
From its inception, Access International’s headquarters were in Suite 2206 of 509 Madison Avenue, the same office where Mr. Villehuchet killed himself.
Access International had connections to wealthy and powerful aristocrats from Europe. Its funds enlisted intermediaries with links to the cream of Europe's high society to garner clients. It had invested a reported US$1.4 billion with the disgraced investor and fund manager Bernard Madoff. De la Villehuchet had also invested his personal money with Madoff's business.
According to The New York Times, de la Villehuchet's older brother Bertrand said that René-Thierry was connected to Madoff by René-Thierry's partner in AIA, Patrick Littaye, another French banker, and that René-Thierry had not known Madoff personally.
Over the last 20 years, de la Villehuchet was renovating and organizing the archives of Le Château de Plouër (a private property) in Plouër-sur-Rance, Brittany, which he'd inherited from an uncle, and was nearly finished with the endeavor at the time of his death.
December 17, 2008 - Christen Schnor, 49, a Danish-born senior executive with HSBC bank, was discovered hanging by a belt, naked, in the wardrobe of his £500-a-night suite at the Jumeriah Carlton Tower Hotel, Cadogan Place, in Knightsbridge, London, having also rented a £390-a-day apartment for his wife and two children in Lower Sloane Street, in the same upper-class area. Schnor worked at HSBC’s Canary Wharf office. (According to Above Top Secret, his death resembles that of Amschel Rothschild who was discovered hanging in a high-class hotel in Paris on 11th July 1996.)
December 5, 2008 - Alex Widmer, 52, Chief Executive of Bank Julius Baer, Zürich, died by suicide. A bank spokesman carefully pointed out that there was no link between Widmer’s death and the group’s "current" activities, but declined to give further details on the cause of Widmer’s death, saying it was a "private matter."
November 17, 2008 - Paulo Sergio Silva, 36, a trader for the brokerage arm of Brazilian banking giant Itau, shot himself in the chest during the afternoon trading session of Sao Paulo, Brazil's commodities and futures exchange in an apparent suicide attempt. He shot himself in the open outcry pit. Hospital staff said he was in critical condition.
November 15, 2008 - Rajendra Gupta, in his late 30s, a Gurgaon beverage dealer, apparently staggering under the weight of stock losses, hanged himself from the ceiling with his wife’s sari, after leaving behind a note donating his eyes. In his suicide note, Gupta, father of two kids, said he was unable to bear the huge losses following the crash.
October 25, 2008 - An unnamed 47-year-old man from Gwangju who suffered serious depression after huge losses on the stock market, died by suicide. He invested 370 million won after taking out a mortgage on his house and using his life insurance as security for the loan two years ago, but the recent financial recession resulted in him losing about 60 percent of his total investment.
"When the nation's stock market index fell below 1,000 [earlier in October], he stopped eating and went on a drinking binge for days and finally decided to kill himself,'' his wife was quoted as saying to police.
October 22, 2008 - An unnamed 42-year-old branch manager of an insurance company was found dead in an apparent suicide on a mountain in Gongju, South Chungcheong Province, South Korea. Police believe that he killed himself due to concerns over losses his firm recorded with various insurance products.
October 9, 2008 - An unnamed 32-year-old employee from a security firm was found hanging at an inn in Seoul, South Korea, which police claimed was related to the stock market crash.
September 25, 2008 - Kirk Stephenson, a London investment-fund executive, ate breakfast with his wife and eight-year-old son, then drove to a train station about 30 miles from his Chelsea home. As an express train approached, Stephenson stepped onto the tracks, according to British Transport Police. The driver applied emergency brakes but couldn't stop in time. Stephenson, 47 years old, died at the scene.
May 23, 2008 - Barry Fox, a Bear Stearns executive, took a drug overdose and then leapt to his death from the 29th floor of his Fort Lee, New Jersey, office. He was a research supervisor who worked for nine years at Bear Stearns. He jumped after he learned he wouldn't be hired by JP Morgan Chase, which was about to buy his firm. A coroner confirmed in an autopsy report that the death was a suicide.
Fox was devastated by the implosion of Bear Stearns and the financial hit he was likely to face, says Fred Philippi, his longtime companion. After several personal setbacks, "this Bear Stearns thing happened to be the last straw that broke his spirit," Philippi said in an interview.
Interestingly, some media also are including the following individual as noteworthy as a "stock market crash"-related suicide, even though this death occurred 7 years ago.
January 25, 2002 - J. Clifford Baxter, 43, was a former Enron Corporation executive who resigned in May 2001. He sold a large quantity of Enron stock during the months prior to Enron bankruptcy. Reportedly, Baxter clashed with CEO Jeffrey Skilling over questionable Enron business practices. Before his death, he had agreed to testify before Congress in the Enron case.
Baxter was found dead in his black Mercedes-Benz S500 in Sugar Land, Texas, with a gunshot wound through the right side of his head. The ammunition used was a "Glaser Safety Slug," which at the time was misreported as rat-shot. A revolver was found in his car and a suicide note was found in his wife's car at their home. An autopsy was performed by the Harris County Medical Examiner's Office and the death was ruled a suicide. His suicide note was hand printed, though not signed, for his wife Carol. The letter expressed Baxter's despair over the direction his life had taken.
Hauntingly, Baxter was born in Amityville, New York.
The idea of Wall Street financiers leaping to their deaths during the stock-market crash of 1929 is largely myth, but it is myth rooted in a shred of truth: A handful of brokers did choose to end their lives through such extreme measures. ~ MarketWatch, April 22, 2009.
For more about how the media are discussing the "1929 Stock Market Crash" folklore about stockbroker suicides, see here and here.
The "W.C. Varones Blog" has a list of 92 deaths (some suicides) of mostly non-celebrities, related to mortgages and foreclosures. Above Top Secret also list both suicides and possible murders here.
What I am attempting to do is first track the more high-profile "celebrity suicides" that appear to be getting some attention in the American and international media.
Showing posts with label Stock Market Suicides. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Stock Market Suicides. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Freddie Mac Chief Dies By Suicide
Has there been another "Great Recession" suicide, the kind of newsmaker that the media has been waiting to elevate to "celebrity death" status?
Update: ABC News Alerts is sending this out as an online bulletin. Breaking News from ABCNEWS.com: Freddie Mac CFO Found Hanging in His Basement, Law Enforcement Officials Tell ABC News [9:37 a.m. ET].
The media is building this into a lead story for the day. As I have written, flashing out the graphic details of the method of the suicide, especially in headline or bulletin form, as seen here above from ABC (and now others?) ties into research indicating behavior contagion follows.
Earlier reports were as follows:
David Kellermann, acting chief financial officer of Freddie Mac, died by suicide in his Hunter Mill Estates home on Wednesday morning, April 23, 2009, according to WTOP.
Fairfax County Police spokeswoman Mary Anne Jennings tells WTOP that Kellermann, 41, police responded to the home after family members called police around 5 a.m.
Police were called at 4:48 a.m. EDT to Reston, Virginia, spokeswoman Lucy Caldwell told Reuters.
"We were called from inside the house to come investigate an apparent suicide," Jennings says.
"We're not going to give you details of the condition of the body, except to say it was an apparent suicide."
Because of legal ramifications, Jennings says she can't describe the nature of the suicide. A medical examiner will make the final determination that the death was a suicide.
Police on the scene tell WTOP that Kellermann's body was found downstairs, but would not say exactly where.
The Kellermann home, which has two floors above ground and a three-car garage, sits on the corner of Raleigh Hill Road and Brittenford Drive in picturesque Hunter Mill Estates, a neighborhood of single-family homes outside of Vienna, just over the border from Reston. According to Fairfax County tax records, Kellermann's home is assessed at $898,440.
Neighbors driving by the scene tell WTOP they are surprised to hear about Kellermann's suicide. He has been with Freddie Mac for more than 16 years.
He was named acting chief financial officer in September 2008, taking over after Anthony "Buddy" Piszel resigned. Freddie Mac's CEO David Moffett resigned last month.
Government-controlled Freddie Mac, based in McLean, has been criticized heavily for reckless business practices. Some say those practices contributed to the nation's housing and financial crisis. Freddic Mac owns or guarantees about 13 million home loans.
As CFO, Kellermann was responsible for the company's financial controls, financial reporting and oversight of the company's budget and financial planning.
Freddie Mac has declined to comment on Kellermann's death.
Will copycats follow?
Who is on the comprehensive list of individuals who have died by suicide during this economical downturn?
The time for research on this issue is now.
Update: ABC News Alerts is sending this out as an online bulletin. Breaking News from ABCNEWS.com: Freddie Mac CFO Found Hanging in His Basement, Law Enforcement Officials Tell ABC News [9:37 a.m. ET].
The media is building this into a lead story for the day. As I have written, flashing out the graphic details of the method of the suicide, especially in headline or bulletin form, as seen here above from ABC (and now others?) ties into research indicating behavior contagion follows.
Earlier reports were as follows:
David Kellermann, acting chief financial officer of Freddie Mac, died by suicide in his Hunter Mill Estates home on Wednesday morning, April 23, 2009, according to WTOP.
Fairfax County Police spokeswoman Mary Anne Jennings tells WTOP that Kellermann, 41, police responded to the home after family members called police around 5 a.m.
Police were called at 4:48 a.m. EDT to Reston, Virginia, spokeswoman Lucy Caldwell told Reuters.
"We were called from inside the house to come investigate an apparent suicide," Jennings says.
"We're not going to give you details of the condition of the body, except to say it was an apparent suicide."
Because of legal ramifications, Jennings says she can't describe the nature of the suicide. A medical examiner will make the final determination that the death was a suicide.
Police on the scene tell WTOP that Kellermann's body was found downstairs, but would not say exactly where.
The Kellermann home, which has two floors above ground and a three-car garage, sits on the corner of Raleigh Hill Road and Brittenford Drive in picturesque Hunter Mill Estates, a neighborhood of single-family homes outside of Vienna, just over the border from Reston. According to Fairfax County tax records, Kellermann's home is assessed at $898,440.
Neighbors driving by the scene tell WTOP they are surprised to hear about Kellermann's suicide. He has been with Freddie Mac for more than 16 years.
He was named acting chief financial officer in September 2008, taking over after Anthony "Buddy" Piszel resigned. Freddie Mac's CEO David Moffett resigned last month.
Government-controlled Freddie Mac, based in McLean, has been criticized heavily for reckless business practices. Some say those practices contributed to the nation's housing and financial crisis. Freddic Mac owns or guarantees about 13 million home loans.
As CFO, Kellermann was responsible for the company's financial controls, financial reporting and oversight of the company's budget and financial planning.
Freddie Mac has declined to comment on Kellermann's death.
Will copycats follow?
Who is on the comprehensive list of individuals who have died by suicide during this economical downturn?
The time for research on this issue is now.
Monday, November 17, 2008
Suicide Attempt at Brazilian Exchange; Suicides in India & Korea
Reuters is reporting that a Brazilian trader shot himself on Monday, November 17th, in the open outcry pit of Sao Paulo's commodities and futures exchange in an apparent suicide attempt. Trading was halted for a few minutes after the shot was fired on Monday, right before the regularly scheduled closing time.
Paulo Sergio Silva, 36, a trader for the brokerage arm of Brazilian banking giant Itau (ITAU4.SA: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), shot himself in the chest during the afternoon trading session, the exchange said, and hospital staff said he was in critical condition.
Silva was given first aid on the scene before being transported to the hospital, BM&F Bovespa SA (BVMF3.SA: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), which operates the exchange, said in a statement without providing further details.
Traders said the incident happened in the interest rate futures pit, a raucous circle where on average $21 billion worth of contracts exchange hands every day.
Brazil's financial markets have taken a pounding in recent months as the global credit crunch has spread, causing massive losses for investors and companies alike.
Brazil's main stock index, the Bovespa .BVSP, has plunged more than 50 percent since hitting an all-time high in late May. The local currency, the real BRBY, has shed a third of its value since touching a nine-year high in early August.
Meanwhile, in India, The Telegraph of Calcutta has reported on a Gurgaon beverage dealer, apparently staggering under the weight of stock losses, who has died by suicide after leaving behind a note donating his eyes.
Rajendra Gupta, in his late 30s, hanged himself from the ceiling with his wife’s sari on Saturday night, November 15th, at his home in the Helimandi police station area of Gurgaon, near Delhi.
It isn’t clear how much money Gupta lost in the market crash but police said he had started investing in shares a few months ago, hoping to boost his earnings.
In his suicide note, Gupta, father of two kids, said he was unable to bear the huge losses following the crash.
“My last request to my family is to donate my eyes,” he wrote.
A police officer said it was possible Gupta had taken loans to invest and was finding it difficult to repay them.
Since the family accepted his request to donate his eyes, a civil hospital doctor removed them and conducted the post-mortem,” sub-inspector Hawa Singh of Helimandi police station said over the phone from Gurgaon.
Gupta’s soft drinks agency on Gurgaon’s Pataudi Road was said to be doing well, which has left his family struggling to understand what drove him to risk investing in stocks.
Stock market related suicides are being reported in Korea, as well. The gloomy stock market in South Korea has begun to claim victims with investors committing suicide after losing money in the recent series of crashes.
According to police reports, a 47-year-old man from Gwangju who suffered serious depression after huge losses on the stock market, died by suicide on October 25, 2008.
He invested 370 million won after taking out a mortgage on his house and using his life insurance as security for the loan two years ago, but the recent financial recession resulted in him losing about 60 percent of his total investment.
"When the nation's stock market index fell below 1,000 [earlier in October], he stopped eating and went on a drinking binge for days and finally decided to kill himself,'' his wife was quoted as saying to police.
On the same day, a couple in their 60s from Busan were saved by police during their suicide attempt.
They borrowed 100 million won from a security company last year and invested 130 million won on the stock market. But they lost most of the money in the recent crashes.
On Oct. 22, a 42-year-old branch manager of an insurance company was found dead in an apparent suicide on a mountain in Gongju, South Chungcheong Province. Police believe that he killed himself due to concerns over losses his firm recorded with various insurance products.
On Oct. 9, a 32-year-old employee from a security firm was found hanging at an inn in Seoul, which police claimed was also related to the stock market crash.
In the United Kingdom, rumblings about the "first" market crash suicide are still in the papers.
...wrote Ianthe Jeanne Dugan and Cassell Bryan-Low in the article "In a Suicide, Crisis and Life Cross," published in the November 15, 2008 issue of The Wall Street Journal.
Nick Cohen of London's Observer on November 9th, noted:
(Reuters reporting by Daniela Machado and Filipe Pacheco, writing by Todd Benson; editing by Eric Beech; unnamed correspondent in India; Kim Tae-jong in Korea.)
Paulo Sergio Silva, 36, a trader for the brokerage arm of Brazilian banking giant Itau (ITAU4.SA: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), shot himself in the chest during the afternoon trading session, the exchange said, and hospital staff said he was in critical condition.
Silva was given first aid on the scene before being transported to the hospital, BM&F Bovespa SA (BVMF3.SA: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), which operates the exchange, said in a statement without providing further details.
Traders said the incident happened in the interest rate futures pit, a raucous circle where on average $21 billion worth of contracts exchange hands every day.
Brazil's financial markets have taken a pounding in recent months as the global credit crunch has spread, causing massive losses for investors and companies alike.
Brazil's main stock index, the Bovespa .BVSP, has plunged more than 50 percent since hitting an all-time high in late May. The local currency, the real BRBY, has shed a third of its value since touching a nine-year high in early August.
Meanwhile, in India, The Telegraph of Calcutta has reported on a Gurgaon beverage dealer, apparently staggering under the weight of stock losses, who has died by suicide after leaving behind a note donating his eyes.
Rajendra Gupta, in his late 30s, hanged himself from the ceiling with his wife’s sari on Saturday night, November 15th, at his home in the Helimandi police station area of Gurgaon, near Delhi.
It isn’t clear how much money Gupta lost in the market crash but police said he had started investing in shares a few months ago, hoping to boost his earnings.
In his suicide note, Gupta, father of two kids, said he was unable to bear the huge losses following the crash.
“My last request to my family is to donate my eyes,” he wrote.
A police officer said it was possible Gupta had taken loans to invest and was finding it difficult to repay them.
Since the family accepted his request to donate his eyes, a civil hospital doctor removed them and conducted the post-mortem,” sub-inspector Hawa Singh of Helimandi police station said over the phone from Gurgaon.
Gupta’s soft drinks agency on Gurgaon’s Pataudi Road was said to be doing well, which has left his family struggling to understand what drove him to risk investing in stocks.
Stock market related suicides are being reported in Korea, as well. The gloomy stock market in South Korea has begun to claim victims with investors committing suicide after losing money in the recent series of crashes.
According to police reports, a 47-year-old man from Gwangju who suffered serious depression after huge losses on the stock market, died by suicide on October 25, 2008.
He invested 370 million won after taking out a mortgage on his house and using his life insurance as security for the loan two years ago, but the recent financial recession resulted in him losing about 60 percent of his total investment.
"When the nation's stock market index fell below 1,000 [earlier in October], he stopped eating and went on a drinking binge for days and finally decided to kill himself,'' his wife was quoted as saying to police.
On the same day, a couple in their 60s from Busan were saved by police during their suicide attempt.
They borrowed 100 million won from a security company last year and invested 130 million won on the stock market. But they lost most of the money in the recent crashes.
On Oct. 22, a 42-year-old branch manager of an insurance company was found dead in an apparent suicide on a mountain in Gongju, South Chungcheong Province. Police believe that he killed himself due to concerns over losses his firm recorded with various insurance products.
On Oct. 9, a 32-year-old employee from a security firm was found hanging at an inn in Seoul, which police claimed was also related to the stock market crash.
In the United Kingdom, rumblings about the "first" market crash suicide are still in the papers.
On a mild Thursday morning in late September 2008, Kirk Stephenson, a London investment-fund executive, ate breakfast with his wife and eight-year-old son, then drove to a train station about 30 miles from his Chelsea home.
As an express train approached, Mr. Stephenson stepped onto the tracks, according to British Transport Police. The driver applied emergency brakes but couldn't stop in time. Mr. Stephenson, 47 years old, died at the scene.
...wrote Ianthe Jeanne Dugan and Cassell Bryan-Low in the article "In a Suicide, Crisis and Life Cross," published in the November 15, 2008 issue of The Wall Street Journal.
Nick Cohen of London's Observer on November 9th, noted:
The Buckinghamshire coroner has yet to hear the case of Kirk Stephenson, but Fleet Street already knows why he threw himself in front of an express train. He was the "first City suicide of the credit crunch" (the Mirror). His death "evokes memories of the 1929 Wall Street crash" (the Mail).
(Reuters reporting by Daniela Machado and Filipe Pacheco, writing by Todd Benson; editing by Eric Beech; unnamed correspondent in India; Kim Tae-jong in Korea.)
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