Who Is Margaret Fagenson? Wall Street Tycoon's 68-Year-Old Wife Leaps To Her Death On Upper East Side

The wife of a wealthy Wall Streeter leaped to her death Thursday from the 14th floor balcony of her luxury Upper East Side apartment. Margaret Fagenson, 68, reportedly had been suffering from depression.

She apparently pulled a small ladder from her closet and set it against the railing of her terrace as a maid worked in another room. She climbed the ladder, jumped, and fell to her death at about 10:50 a.m. She died at the scene after landing on the side of the building of her East 86th St. apartment near Carl Schurz Park, known as the Henderson House, police and witnesses said.

“I heard a loud ‘boom’ noise and I waited a couple minutes,” Rodney Bissoondath, 37, a doorman from across the street told the Daily News. “By the time I went outside, the cops were already putting sheets on the person.”

One witness said Fagenson was too far to save, and another source confirmed that Fagenson did not leave a note. Robert Fagenson, her husband of 45 years, stood by his wife’s body -- devastated -- as he held the leashes of their two dogs, witnesses said.

He is the chairman and CEO of Fagenson and Co., a money management and investment broker firm. Robert and Margaret Fagenson owned a $2.8 million unit in the Henderson House, a 22-story high-rise with a full-time doorman. Three-bedroom units sold for $2.5 million, officials said.

The couple was known for supporting animal rescue groups, such as the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and the Humane Society of St. Thomas, Virgin Islands. In the recent months, Fagenson volunteered in the kitten nursery and read to abused dogs.

In 2011, Robert and Margaret Fagenson, who met in high school, donated $75,000 to the North Shore Animal League America, according to the Wall Street Journal. They were named "Donors of the Day."

“We’re nutty pet people,” [Robert] Fagenson told the Wall Street Journal.

A shocked friend said to the New York Post: “She is the last person who would do such a thing.”

Bissoondath said this was the third person to jump from the luxury building in recent years.

“It’s insane,” he said.

Fagenson was survived by her husband, Robert, her two daughters, Stephanie and Jennifer and granddaughter, Sophie.

Services will be held Monday, Jan. 30th 11:00 a.m. at Frank E. Campbell, 1076 Madison Ave., at 81st St.