In ancient Greek mythology, Cassandra was a woman who had the power to predict horrible events, but was cursed because nobody ever believed her prophecies. Presumably the people around her were also cursed with constantly hearing, “I told you so.”

While we haven’t quite unlocked the power of prophecy, as evidenced by rarity of lottery winners, the tale of the whistleblower who tries to warn of serious crimes or negligence but is brushed off by naysayers is a tragically common one. Here are four modern day Cassandras who only had their words heeded after the worst had already happened.

Harry Markopolos

In 1999, Harry Markopolos was a Chief Investment Officer at Rampart, and was one of many financial executives who worked on Wall Street. He would have been happy simply working to help build up his company, but he wound up spending years uncovering a scandal that would break financial history records and ultimately make Kevin Bacon a sad, sad man.

What He Knew

Other executives at Rampart knew of a hedge fund manager who got crazy big returns. Investors would give seasoned financial veteran Bernie Madoff carte blanche over their money, and he would consistently deliver 1-2% return on their investment every month. Markopolos was asked to replicate Madoff’s financial success, so he started going over the numbers.

It took about five minutes for Markopolos to realize that Madoff was breaking the law. It took him about four hours to mathematically prove that Madoff’s returns were impossible to legally achieve.

In a perfect world, the story would end there. Madoff would be proven a fraud, Markopolos would go back to work, and the whole world would be happy that there was one less crook working in the financial sector. Unfortunately, there’s a big difference between knowing you’re right and convincing other people that you’re right.

Markopolos filed his first complaint with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in the spring of 2000. This caused the SEC to do what government bureaucrats are usually best at: a whole lot of nothing. He tried again a year later, filing a more detailed report, and even offering to go to Madoff’s office undercover in order to obtain more information. The SEC merely shrugged the whole thing off.

Markopolos struggled for years to get someone to take notice of a man who was obviously stealing billions. Thinking that his reports weren’t getting noticed because they didn’t have a snappy title, in 2005 Markopolos wrote a 21-page memo called “The World's Largest Hedge Fund is a Fraud.”

That led to a half-hearted and easily thwarted investigation by the SEC. It closed in 2007, having found no evidence of fraud. Which is very odd, considering what happened next.

Then This Happened

In 2008, eight years after Markopolos first raised red flags, Madoff was arrested by the FBI and charged with securities fraud. Prosecutors estimated the amount of the fraud to be around $64.8 Billion. That’s a little more extreme than your friend borrowing fifty bucks and totally forgetting to pay you back. It’s more like your friend borrowing more than the entire Gross Domestic Product of Costa Rica and then giving you the finger when you ask for the cash.

The fallout led to countless investors losing everything they had. Even actor Kevin Bacon, who trusted Madoff with the fortune he made during his acting career, lost almost everything. So for Kevin Bacon fans, this might actually be good news. If you happen to notice the Footloose star acting in a lot more movies and TV shows lately, you have Madoff to thank.

Roger Boisjoly

Roger Boisjoly was a mechanical engineer who worked for the company Morton Thiokol, which contracted for NASA in the 1980s. While most of the company was happy to work for such a high-profile client, Boisjoly had concerns about some of the parts it supplied to the space shuttle Challenger.

What He Knew

In July of 1985, Boisjoly wrote a strongly-worded memo to his superiors explaining that if the temperature was low on a launch day, it might cause the seals that connect to the Challenger shuttle’s rocket boosters to fail. And since rocket boosters produce an explosion so massive it can literally launch people into outer space, “fail” here is used in the most terrifying sense of the word. “The result could be a catastrophe of the highest order,” he wrote, “loss of human life.”

The memo was ignored, but right up until the end Boisjoly’s worries remained.

On January 27th 1986, the night before the planned liftoff of the space shuttle Challenger, Boisjoly noticed that temperatures had dropped below freezing at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Boisjoly, with the help of other engineers, pleaded with their bosses to delay the launch. They declined, and the launch continued as planned.

But Then This Happened

You know how this story ends.

73 seconds after launch, the shuttle broke apart in mid-air leading to the deaths of all seven crew members aboard. The culprit? To the surprise of no one who listened to Boisjoly, it was the faulty seals, which had never been tested in temperatures so low. Boisjoly testified at the investigation of the tragedy, and before his death in 2012 he spent his final years offering workshops and lectures on workplace ethics.

Ishibashi Katsuhiko

Most of the time, nuclear energy is great. It’s efficient, it produces far fewer pollutants than coal or gas, and there are plenty of nuclear materials to use. However, under extreme conditions nuclear power plants can be extremely hazardous, a fact that Ishibashi Katsuhiko knew all too well.

What He Knew

Scientists are very good at predicting the weather, but so far no one has come up with a good way to predict earthquakes. This is what drove Japanese seismologist, Ishibashi Katsuhiko, to be part of a 2006 government subcommittee charged with setting guidelines for earthquake safety of nuclear power plants. Nuclear power plants are usually very stable, but a severe enough earthquake can cause a meltdown. Ishibashi later quit the body, saying that the process was “rigged and unscientific.”

Ishibashi didn’t give up. In 2007, he pressed his concerns with an article titled, Why Worry? Japan’s Nuclear Plants At Risk for Quake Damage.

And how did the Japan Atomic Power Company react to these dire warnings that something terrible would happen if power plants didn’t deal with the threat of earthquakes? In reference to Ishibashi, JAPCO spokesperson Masao Urakami said, “We can’t respond to every claim by every scientist. Standards for seismic ground motion are not decided arbitrarily, but are based on findings by experts assigned by the government.”

But Then This Happened

Evidently the fault lines that lead to power plant-destroying earthquakes don’t have high regard for “experts assigned by the government.” In 2011, the fifth largest earthquake ever recorded hit Japan, causing a massive Tsunami to destroy the coastline. The disaster caused three reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant to melt down. The increased risk of radiation forced the government to order citizens to evacuate the area around the plant. Three years after the event, officials are still struggling with issues like radioactive water leaks.

Dinesh Thakur

If something is awesome, then the cheaper version of it must necessarily be more awesome. This is part of the reason why generic drugs are so popular all over the world. You get the same chemicals that make your mind and body work like you want them to, at a fraction of the cost. However, sometimes it helps if the drugs you’re taking are everything they’re supposed to be.

What He Knew

One of the biggest suppliers of these discount drugs is Ranbaxy, a company based in India. The UK government, eager to save billions on prescription costs, wanted to provide its citizens with all the dirt cheap drugs they needed. But the agency in charge of approving the drugs was warned by Dinesh Thakur that British patients were being put at risk by “spurious, untested medicines” produced by Ranbaxy. He also warned in 2005 that “Ranbaxy is defrauding the UK government and the British public and hoping that [you] would be able to do something to stop this crime.” And who was this Thakur fellow? Some conspiracy nut who hated cheap drugs?

No, actually. He was a senior executive at Ranbaxy. So it was a bit like Mark Zuckerberg warning you that using Facebook is a bad idea.

In response he was thanked for “bringing this matter to our attention.” For those who don’t know, that’s government drone-speak for “Please stop bothering me.”

But Then This Happened

You’re welcome Brits — it looks like America saved the day again.

In 2013, following an investigation by American government agencies, Ranbaxy pleaded guilty to several counts of selling adulterated drugs with intent to defraud, along with a bunch of other charges. The company was forced to pay $500 Million in criminal and civil penalties, and under whistleblower law Thakur earned $48 Million.

But it couldn’t actually have been that bad right? I mean, you’d have to be seriously evil in order to knowingly give bad medicine to sick people who desperately need it. You’d have to be twisted on the level of a James Bond villain to not care that people are dying because of your crappy pills.

It turns out that evil knows no depths. According to Fortune Magazine, one executive was totally unconcerned about the poor quality of AIDS drugs supplied to African nations.

“Who cares?” he said, “It’s just blacks dying.” Wow.

Warning

So what should you do if you have information about a serious crime or negligence? You could always deliver a tip to the FBI. And if that doesn’t work? If these stories are any indication, you might have to struggle for years before anyone believes you. It will be a big sacrifice, but there’s a solid chance you’ll get a book deal if you wind up being right.

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