Broker Linked to Madoff Funds Sued for Losing Millions of Investor Dollars

A New York City investment broker with ties to admitted Wall Street scam artist Bernard Madoff is being sued by two former clients who blame him for losing their money in Madoff’s historic Ponzi scheme.

Alvin Delaire, a broker registered with Cohmad Securities Corp., had been a cheerleader for Madoff-run investment programs for years, according to a suit just filed by a married couple from Long Island.

Martin and Suzanne Schulman accuse Delaire of failing to advise them of Madoff’s $65 billion Ponzi scheme despite being “personally familiar” with the scam. The couple is seeking at least $9.6 million in damages from their lawsuit.

The couple claims they were induced to invest with Madoff “based on fraudulent misrepresentations by Delaire and his omissions to disclose material facts.”

According to the lawsuit, the Schulmans had invested through Delaire since 2002 and earned better-than-average returns. However, they now accuse their former broker of violating his fiduciary duties to them by failing to reveal Madoff’s crimes.

Allowing Delaire to now keep millions of dollars in commissions and other profits he earned for investing the couple in Madoff’s scam would allow him to be unjustly enriched, the suit claims.

Delaire is the latest former business associate of Madoff to face some heat. Madoff’s former accountant was charged with securities fraud for allegedly lying about having conducted independent audits of Madoff’s accounts when in fact no such audits had been done.

The sons and wife of the former money manager also have had some of their personal assets frozen as federal authorities continue trying to unravel the largest financial scam in Wall Street history.

Madoff, 70, pleaded guilty in March 2009 and admitted that he bilked investors for over 20 years. He remains behind bars awaiting sentencing in June, when he is expected to be sent to prison for the rest of his life.

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