William D. Zabel, who played a pivotal role in voiding the criminal conviction of an interracial couple married in violation of Virginia law, and who wrested billions of dollars from Bernard L. Madoff’s Ponzi scheme by engineering what was at the time the largest civil forfeiture in American history, died on July 7 at his home in Bedford, NY. He was 89.

Mr. Zabel drafted wills and negotiated prenuptial agreements and marital breakups for the rich and famous — among them George Soros, Rupert Murdoch, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Howard Stern, Doris Duke, Jack Welch, and Claus von Bülow. He often said he considered his greatest legacy to be his role in Loving v. Virginia, the case in which the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the conviction of Mildred Loving, a Black woman, and Richard Loving, a white man. Mr. Zabel was the lead author of the pivotal amicus brief supporting the Lovings, which proved persuasive. The decision enshrined marriage as a fundamental right under the 14th Amendment, which provides for “equal protection of the laws.”

Mr. Zabel also play an essential role in enabling compensation for victims of the fraud scheme that Mr. Madoff ran. Of the more than $4 billion made available to victims, approximately $2.2 billion was collected as part of the civil-forfeiture recovery from the Picower estate that Mr. Zabel negotiated. An additional $1.7 billion was collected as part of a deferred prosecution agreement with JPMorgan Chase. The settlements enabled victims of the Ponzi scheme to be compensated.

Stanley M. Gartler , a molecular biologist and geneticist who helped provide the first convincing evidence that cancerous tumors develop from a single mutated cell involving the first collection of human cells to permanently thrive in a laboratory, died on May 25 at his home in Seattle. He was 102.

In 1965, while studying genetic markers that vary in human cells, he found that in 18 supposedly independent cultures, the genetic markers were identical. It became clear to him that the supposedly unique cells had become contaminated by the first permanent human cell line called the HeLa line, an abbreviation of the first and last names of Henrietta Lacks, a Black woman who had died of cervical cancer in 1951. Her genetic information harvested from a tissue biopsy shortly before her death had been shipped and studied in laboratories around the world without her consent or her family’s knowledge.

Dr. Gartler’s discovery has been credited as a catalyst for improved quality control in labs and enhanced authentication of cell lines. The story of the HeLa line became one of the defining lessons of 20th-century medicine, and raised important ethical questions about informed consent of patients, privacy and the rights of families to receive compensation for research on a relative’s cells.

Leonard Abramson, a former pharmacist who built U.S. Healthcare, one of the first health Maintenance organizations, and who used some of the nearly $1 billion he received from selling it to give generously to cancer research and other medical causes, died on July 4 at his home in Blue Bell, PA. He was 93.

During the 30 years following the sale of U.S. Healthcare, Mr. Abramson used his wealth for philanthropic causes: $100 million to establish the Leonard and Madlyn Abramson Family Cancer Research Institute at the University of Pennsylvania’s cancer center; later contributions to the cancer center brought the total to more than $140 million; $15 million to help start the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s pediatric research center; $10 million to Temple University’s dental school; $2.5 million to the pediatric emergency department of the children’s hospital in King of Prussia, PA, and $10 million to the Jupiter Medical Center in Florida.

Yaacov Agam, an Israeli artists whose brightly colored geometric sculptures and paintings delighted the eye with optical illusions and moving parts, and whose many public artworks included the world’s largest menorah and a rainbow-hued fountain that breathed fire and played music, died on June 18 at his home in Rishon LeZion, Israel. He was 98.

Mr. Agam called his works Agamographs, and he created an eyepiece with prisms for viewing them, calling it the Agamoscope.

“Art is one of the most important things from a moral, educational and public point of view,” Mr. Agam told the Haaretz newspaper of Israel in 2011. “We need art in the public space, not in the museums and not in the collections of rich people.”

Rudolph Marcus, a Canadian-born American chemist who received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for developing a theory that helped explain the electrochemical processes behind photosynthesis, respiration, oxidation and even how fireflies produce light, died on July 17 at his home in Pasadena, CA. He was 102.

Sarah Reisman, chair of the chemistry and chemical engineering division of the California Institute of Technology, where Dr. Marcus had taught since 1978, said that it was almost impossible to state the importance of Dr. Marcus’s work. “It provides a simple theory for one of the most fundamental processes in chemistry, and has been applied to understanding reactions ranging from small-molecule catalysts to proteins involved in photosynthesis,” she said.

Dr. Marcus received dozens of awards, among them the Wolf Prize, considered to be the most prestigious award in chemistry after the Nobel, and also the esteemed National Medal of Science.

It is with great sadness that The Shofar reports the unexpected passing on June 13 of Roberta Conway, long-time partner of esteemed shul member Arthur Riegel. Those of us who knew Roberta will remember her warm smile and delightful sense of humor. She will be greatly missed. The Shofar joins the membership in mourning her death.

Alan Greenspan, the influential economist who steered U.S. monetary policy during his five terms as chairman of the Federal Reserve under four presidents, died June 22 at his home in Washington, D.C. He was 100.

Greenspan helped to define modern American capitalism from the final years of the Cold War era through the dawn of the digital age. He presided over the Fed during one of the longest economic expansions in U.S. history, a boom stretching from 1991 to 2001.

Greenspan’s initial foray into the political world came in 1967, when he served as an adviser on Richard Nixon’s presidential campaign. He assisted with Mixon’s transition to the Oval Office, but turned down an official role in the administration.

In Gerald Ford’s administration, he took a position as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, serving until 1977. He pursued policies that, together with tighter monetary policy from the Paul Volcker-led Federal Reserve, helped reduce inflation from 11% to 6.5%.

Greenspan received various national and international accolades: In 2000, the French government awarded him the Legion of Honor; in 2002, Queen Elizabeth II named him an honorary Knight of the British Empire. In 2005, then-President George W. Bush awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the U.S.’s highest civilian honor.

In a statement on Greenspan’s death, the Fed said, he “brought rigorous analytical discipline to monetary policymaking, and helped establish the credibility that remains one of the central bank’s most important assets. Chairman Greenspan’s legacy endures at the Federal Reserve — in those he mentored directly, in the economists and public servants he inspired, and in the frameworks and practices he helped shape.”