SEATTLE – Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro (HBSS) announced it is investigating the investments and perpetrators of the Bernard Madoff Ponzi scheme on behalf of investors. HBSS is investigating the potential for a lawsuit on behalf of investors after news broke the long-standing investor was arrested and allegedly charged with billions of dollars in securities fraud, and their general partner informed the investors that their investments were with Madoff.

If you or your group invested with Bernard Madoff, Bernard Madoff Investment Securities, or BMIS, please contact plaintiff's counsel at [email protected] or 510-725-3000.

Bernard Madoff -- by his own admission -- as the head of a hedge fund off Wall Street, was arrested yesterday for financial fraud. Madoff, 70, who has operated his own multi-billion dollar investment company since 1960, apparently remarked to his staff earlier in the week that the hedge fund run by his company was a "giant Ponzi scheme."

Madoff told employees that he had approximately $7 billion in redemption requests from his BMIS investor services, which the employee believed had only $8 to $15 billion in assets. Madoff told employees that he was "finished," he had "absolutely nothing," "it's all just one big lie," and that it was "basically, a giant Ponzi scheme."

Madoff apparently had been paying returns for years to certain investors out of the principal received from other, different, investors. Madoff estimated losses from his fraud as being approximately $50 billion.

The alleged scheme could leave investors with billions of dollars in losses and has the potential to be one of the largest Wall Street frauds in history.

Based on information from HBSS sources, the Ponzi scheme consisted of a web of limited partnerships that invested through other partnerships. For example, investors in CMG, Ltd. whose investments were placed with the partnership called the Brighton Company, were told today that the "worst" has happened and that their money was invested with Madoff's organization as broker.

If you invested in a similar partnership, had investments directly or indirectly with Madoff or his entities, or have information about this scheme, please contact Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro counsel at [email protected]. 

Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro, a law firm with offices in Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Boston, Chicago, Phoenix and New York is active in major litigation pending in federal and state courts throughout the United States and has taken a leading role in many important actions on behalf of defrauded investors, consumers, and companies, as well as victims of human rights violations.
 

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About Hagens Berman
Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro LLP is a consumer-rights class-action law firm with offices in ten cities. The firm has been named to the National Law Journal’s Plaintiffs’ Hot List eight times. More about the law firm and its successes can be found at www.hbsslaw.com. Follow the firm for updates and news at @ClassActionLaw.

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