In the months after Bernie Madoff confessed to running the world’s largest Ponzi scheme, plenty of wild rumors began to circulate, including the most recent one–circulated by the New York Post–that alleged he had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.

We still don’t know whether Madoff, his lawyers, or representatives of the Madoff family started the rumor to engender public sympathy for the man that so many have vilified as a “monster,” or to potentially lessen the impending charges against Madoff’s suspected accomplices by prosecutors.

What we do know is that the rumor is just that: a rumor. Moreover, if there’s anything we should have learned from this case it’s that we can’t trust anything Bernie says. After all, he lied to his customers and regulators for decades when he told them that his legitimate and successful broker-dealer firm was connected to his illegitimate, long-unregistered hedge fund. And, even after the jig was up, he lied when he said he’d acted alone (his right-hand-man, Frank DiPascali, plead guilty in August to having doctored mountains of phony hedge fund statements along with “co-conspirators,” who have yet to be named).

I, like many people, have read the headlines about Bernie calling him a liar and a cheat, but I’ve also spent the past several years researching his scam and interviewing people who were involved—either as victims, accomplices, or suspicious observers. I can say with certainty that this man simply lacks the constitution to be rigorously honest with himself or with others.

(For the complete story, read Too Good to Be True: The Rise and Fall of Bernie Madoff.)

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