Madoff Scandal: SEC Official Raised Concerns In 2004

washingtonpost.com:

An investigator at the Securities and Exchange Commission warned superiors as far back as 2004 about irregularities at Bernard L. Madoff's financial management firm, but she was told to focus on an unrelated matter, according to agency documents and sources familiar with the investigation.

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Read the whole story: washingtonpost.com

Comments

[old timer 37]

The SEC has become the FEMA of finance for pretty much the same reasons: neglect and abuse by previous Administrations and by Congress so that it is underfunded and browbeaten, laws have been weakened for short term political purposes, those at the top are appointed for being politically compliant not because of their competence or dedication to guarding the public from fraud, and those beneath them are encouraged to act like the three monkeys and see no evil, hear no evil and speak no evil.

To get an effective SEC will take housecleaning that starts with Congress and the Administration.... which have to emphasize clear consistent strategic objectives, toughen laws and enforcement procedures, providie sufficient funding and appoint competent leaders with a reasonable degree of integrity. Then it would help if our government and the press would shine a light on tactical interference by Congress and Administration hacks to induce the SEC to layoff their contributors or contributors to their patron lobbyists.

When you find gross incompetence throughout an organization, like the SEC, FEMA or major Wall Street institutions, the source of the problem is always higher up in the organization chart; so long as the source of institutional pollution isn't cleaned up, the downstream pollution will persist.

[FoonTheElder]

This is the end game of deregulation and Reagan/Bush policies, let the market regulate itself. Works great, huh?

The Bush Administration was so corrupt that it decided that it shouldn't enforce the laws against its big corporate supporters. They did it by underfunding agencies and hiring incompetent lackeys to run the departments (Great job, Brownie).

The moral of the story is to not expect a group of politicians who are against government to be able to run a government.

[mjtaylor22]

i have been saying this over and over again, when their small govt rhetoric meets reality, it becoems complete incompetent and corrupt govt.
Thansk repugnants for completley destabilizing our nations way of life thru your corruption and greed

[WorkingClass]

This is the real Madoff story. The anger directed at Bernie is misplaced.

[Alvin4NY]

He's still a big time lying, thieving thug.....

[The Meek]

Bernie is a SMALL time lying, thieving, thug. The real big timers are still lying thieving and thuging while the publics attention and anger is being diverted towards him.

[IdocNC]

I think people are forgetting that there has been a long era of deregulation pushed more since Ronnie took over and one of the end results is that governmental agencies had no teeth. People should be blaming themselves for putting people with the Friedman free market mentality in power-I hope this will be a hard lesson learned about the importance of government oversight but somehow I have this feeling it will not be.

[Alvin4NY]

It would be nice if this story permeated the airwaves the way Michael Jackson and Farrah have. Nice to see a few protesters present, although I'd prefer a million person march down Wall St. and Park Ave with folks carrying torches....No accountability.

[Ihaveadream]

How true but it's not sexy or salacious.

Harry Markopoulos repeatedly documented this and warned the SEC in writing but they blew him off because those who made billions off these scams paid the most in political donations to keep the SEC off their backs. An IG report shows that the SEC employees were doing everything but their job descriptions. It's all public - go to the SEC IG website and download their investigative reports that were also blown off http://www.sec-oig.gov/

[SamKnause]

Heads should roll, but they won't. The SEC wants to pay whistle blowers on front page of Huffington Post yesterday. If they would do their job when they are alerted to a situation, they wouldn't need to pay whistle blowers. They were not doing their job and it has cost all of us dearly. No one seemed to be doing their jobs for the past 8 years. Now we a few people trying to straighten out their messes, and others that are still not doing their jobs. Our senate and congress are still siding with the big corporations, banks, and Wall Street. They have forgotten that they work for we the people. The salary that they are paid, (though quite substantial for the average American with outstanding benefits), is a mere pittance compared to the money they accept from lobbyist to vote against anything that will benefit we the people.

[TFlint]

So who will represent We The People, now that newspapers are dying? Bloggers?

[inorbit]

Why was she told to investigate other matters?

Something is very fishy and I think staff at the SEC were on the take. This needs to be thoroughly investigated!

[Kristen777]

Who are we kidding? They are all in on it.

[TFlint]

When you pay people low salaries to monitor people who make millions, what do you think will happen?

[WindySailor]

I hope the FBI takes a good, long, long look at Eric Swanson. It is patently obvious why he married Sasha Madoff. It surely wasn't for her looks.

[bbrecht]

Someone at SEC needs to be held accountable-- Madoff is just a symbol.