Compliancex

The owners of the New York Mets baseball team asked a federal judge late Thursday to dismiss a lawsuit by the court-appointed trustee seeking to recover money for victims of convicted Ponzi-scheme-operator Bernard Madoff.

Lawyers for the Mets owners, Fred Wilpon and Saul Katz, argued that the Madoff trustee, Irving Picard, failed to prove they were “willfully blind” to Mr. Madoff’s fraud, which came to light more than three years ago.

“They worked hard for many years and became very successful. They entrusted Madoff with an enormous amount of their money, giving him discretion over their accounts. Their families, close friends, charities, and businesses did the same,” said Karen E. Wagner, a lawyer for Messrs. Wilpon and Katz.

“Why would they have risked it all if they had believed that there was any possibility that Madoff was engaged in a Ponzi scheme? They would not and didn’t.”

Click link to view full article at Wall Street Journal

Chad Bray, Wall Street Journal, January 27, 2012