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Madoff’s wife claims $62 million in ‘separate’ assets

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Ruth Madoff, wife of accused Ponzi scheme operator Bernie Madoff, is trying to persuade a judge that more than $62 million of her assets are ‘unrelated’ to her husband’s alleged $50-billion fraud.

From Bloomberg News:

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U.S. District Judge Louis Stanton, who is presiding over a lawsuit against Madoff by the Securities and Exchange Commission, filed an order Monday modifying terms of an asset freeze on Bernard Madoff’s property. As part of his order, he cited a claim by Ruth Madoff that some of her assets are separate from his. Madoff’s lawyers claim ‘only Ruth Madoff has a beneficial ownership’ to a Manhattan apartment, about $45 million in municipal bonds on deposit at Cohmad Securities Corp., and approximately $17 million in cash in another account, Stanton said. Ruth Madoff, who hasn’t been accused of wrongdoing, says these assets are ‘unrelated’ to the alleged fraud, Stanton wrote, citing her husband’s lawyer.

According to a Newsday report, the Madoffs’ attorneys ‘are taking the position that the assets can’t be seized by the government if Bernard Madoff is convicted of a crime unless they are shown to be the fruits of a crime. The order suggests that prosecutors and defense attorneys may be getting closer to a plea bargain of the case against Madoff.’

Stanton’s order Monday ‘essentially allowed the government to restrain Ruth Madoff’s assets from sale or transfer, but acknowledged that they can’t be seized unless prosecutors link them to crimes,’ Newsday said.

-- Tom Petruno

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