A charitable foundation has sued the U.S. government over the Securities and Exchange Commission’s failure to uncover Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi scheme, reports Bloomberg.
In a lawsuit filed Thursday in New York federal court, the Michael and Ruth Slade Foundation says the regulatory agency’s inaction “was a substantial factor” in the charity’s $2.5-million losses from the Madoff fraud and the billions it cost other investors.
Two individual investors, Alan and Blayne Goldman, filed a similar lawsuit.
0 Responses to Foundation Sues Government, Charging Negligence for Missing Madoff Fraud
shybear309 - March 19, 2010 at 3:30 pm
So where these litigants when G.W. Bush was wacking away at the SEC budget and his Justice Department was slowing investigations?
richard_friedman - March 19, 2010 at 5:13 pm
Money was not the issue with the SEC. He was investigated at least 6 times. Incompetence and negligence, among other reasons the SEC did not discover the Madoff fraud. It did not help either that the SEC often sought out advice from him.Yes, the SEC is guilty as sin for permitting the world’s largest Ponzi scheme to continue unabated from 1991 when they first were given all the information that it was a Ponzi scheme. This was nine years before Harry Markopolos gave them a detailed road map that should have closed him down then.While I am not a fan of the Bush Administration, this problem spans several presidencies, and is just another example as to how the SEC is in bed with the securities industry and the average American, charity, or philanthropic organization has no protection whatsoever.Yes, the market can go up or down, but don’t just allow a multi-billion dollar Ponzi scheme to flourish for maybe 48 years, since the inception of his company! There are no excuses for this, and it continues even today with other schemers.
larry0928 - March 19, 2010 at 7:38 pm
Boo Hoo, When you were getting fat out of this world profit you though it was fine and dandy. 501′s are guided by rules that you looked the other way when it was to your advantage.