Two New York investors have filed a lawsuit against the Securities & Exchange Commission, accusing the SEC of a "pattern of incompetence" in failing to detect and put a stop to Bernie Madoff's Ponzi Scheme.

"Had the SEC carried out its functions with even a minimum of reasonable due care, many, if not most, of Madoff's victims would have been spared the financial ruin they face today," the complaint said.

Allen Stanford gets kicked around, but Bernie Madoff can clearly throw down some serious smack. While the former's being moved from one facility to another because he's lost some ground on the cell block, Madoff just earned himself some props.

The engineer of the largest (known) Ponzi scheme in history apparently got into an argument with another geriatric inmate at the Butner, North Carolina federal prison. Of course, it was over the stock market. Does it really make sense to outmaneuver a guy who never needed to know what the market was doing to deliver double-digit returns?

Well, push came to shove, as they say, with the "attacker" stumbling and looking up at a mean, mean Madoff. He got up and ran off.

Disgraced Ponzi schemer Bernie Madoff's (former) Montauk, Long Island home is no longer on the market. A buyer willing to pay more than the $8.75 million asking price has picked up the property, only two weeks after the U.S. Marshals Service listed it for sale.

Anne Lacombe, spokeswoman for the Corcoran Group, a real estate broker involved in the transaction, said the home was under contract for more than asking but did not have information on the exact amount, buyer or closing date, according to the Associated Press.

Looking for a 4,000-square-foot duplex with four fireplaces and a doorman on the Upper East Side of New York? You are in luck, because the U.S. Marshals will put Bernie Madoff's "luxury penthouse" on the market. The apartment is believed to be worth $7 million, so if you have some extra cash laying around, you could find yourself movin' on up to the Upper East Side. A list of the amenities includes ornate cabinets, stainless steel countertops, Baccarat crystal glasses, a winding staircase to the bedroom, an atrium breakfast nook, and a flat-screen TV in one of the bathrooms.

Frank DiPascali, CFO to convicted fraudster Bernard Madoff, turned in a guilty plea yesterday, as expected. He fessed up to ten charges, including securities fraud, conspiracy, falsifying records and international money laundering. "It was all fictitious," he said, admitting that he "knew it was wrong at the time." Yet, he didn't say a word about anyone other than Madoff.

Each of the charges carries a term of five to 20 years in prison, not to mention fines of up to $5 million. But his cooperation is expected to lessen the blow a bit, though we'll have to wait until at least May 2010 to find out what the outcome will be. We don't even know if DiPascali will be able to wait for sentencing from his own home -- nothing on bail has been determined. The prosecution has asked for a $2.5 million bond, secured by equity in DiPascali's sister's home and co-signed by "three financially responsible individuals," according to a Reuters report.

The May sentencing date suggests that prosecutors will be willing to deal, based on the information DiPascali provides in the interim. District Judge Richard Sullivan, as well, hopes that information will be forthcoming, which he expressed to one of the victims who spoke at the hearing.

David Friehling is only the second person to face criminal charges in the Bernard Madoff debacle. He served as Madoff's auditor from 1991 to 2008, though it's hard to say if they'll resume their relationship as cellies. For now, Friehling has only been charged (innocent until proven guilty, and such) with securities fraud, abetting investment adviser fraud and filing false reports with the SEC. On five of the six charges filed, he faces a 20-year maximum.

It's alleged that Friehling didn't conduct "meaningful" audits while in Madoff's employ, despite issuing reports saying that he'd done his job -- which paid close to $15,000 a month (no work for big pay . . . where do I sign up?). In particular, he's said to have not bothered to verify Madoff's business assets, revenue sources or bank accounts. This is no-brainer stuff for an auditor.

To help Americans understand what prison life will be like for Bernie Madoff, a number of news outlets have enlisted the help of ex-con turned jail expert Larry Levine. After serving a lengthy prison term for narcotics, securities fraud, and weapons charges, Mr. Levine is now operating Wall Street Prison Consultants, a firm that provides advice and training on adjusting to prison life.

To learn a little about what Madoff has to look forward to, watch the video below -- and pay special attention to the last 30 seconds where things go a little, well, off-kilter.

Bernie Madoff, the mastermind behind the world's largest ever Ponzi scheme, arrived at a federal prison in North Carolina to begin serving his 150 year prison sentence.

It will be hard to find anyone sympathetic to the 71 year old investor who will be spending the rest of his life behind bars. We still do not know if Madoff will serve out all of his time at the federal prison in Butner, North Carolina, but for now that is where he can call home.

Bernie Madoff was in federal court today, where he was given a 150 year sentence for charges related to his Ponzi scheme.

Reports from the courtroom state that Madoff, the mastermind behind the largest ever Ponzi scheme, showed little to no emotion today when he learned that he would be spending the rest of his life in a jail cell. Due to federal sentencing guidelines, Madoff must serve at least 80% of his sentence, so he will not be eligible for parole until 2129.

Wednesday, Bernard Madoff requested leniency through his attorney Ira Sorkin, who suggested a sentence of 12 years would be a sufficient penalty for his client's crime of stealing billions of dollars in one of the greatest frauds in history.

Sentencing by U.S. District Judge Denny Chin is set for Monday June 29, and the eyes of the world will be upon him. So will the eyes of the yet-to-be discovered fraudsters everywhere.

My thoughts on the subject are relatively simple and have little to do with revenge or payback. In cases like this I often remember a very old quote from another time and place.

If you had a couple hundred thousand dollars laying around and were hoping to give Bernie Madoff another shot at money management, I have some bad news: Per the terms of a partial settlement with the SEC, he has now been officially barred from the securities industry for life.

Of course, Madoff is in jail and will be in a coffin the next time he's out of jail, so unless he was planning to securitize Pruno futures, there was probably nothing to worry about.

Bernie Madoff's long-time secretary Eleanor Squillari is capitalizing on her shot at 15 minutes of fame, co-authoring a 9,000 word article for the June issue of Vanity Fair. A sneak peak is available on the Vanity Fair website now.

What does she have to say about Madoff? According to Squillari, Madoff "had a roving eye and . . . a habit of getting frequent massages."

"One day, I caught him scouting the escort pages that run alongside pictures of scantily clad women in the back of a magazine," she said. "He straightened up in his chair, startled, and said, 'I'm just looking!' " The most interesting bit is this one:

The Wall Street Journal reports (subscription required) that "Investors with Bernard Madoff who had a net loss due to his fraud won't be asked to return funds they withdrew from his firm in recent years, said a lawyer who is charged with recovering the firm's assets."

The trustee had recently sent letters to a number of investors asking them to return a total of $735 million in funds withdrawn over the past six years -- the legal limit for how far back the court can go in a fraud case. In a way, it makes sense to limit the demands for funds to people who made money: If you invested $10 million with Madoff and withdrew $8 million, why should you have to send money in to the trustee to take your chances in the bankruptcy court?

Will financial reporting ever have a Woodward and Bernstein, the two metro desk Washington Post reporters who broke the Watergate Scandal? After attending last night's panel on Financial Journalism Under Fire: Did We Do Our Job?, hosted by the New York Financial Writers Association, the answer is clear: no. (Changes may and should happen, and I'll touch on a few of those).

I have a theory that if you took a psychological assessment of a sports writer, a political reporter, and a financial writer to see who was the most cynical, the answer would most definitely be the financial writer. They're reporting on an industry ruled by greed and people who make more money in a year than they'll see in a lifetime. The system is just too large, too shady, and too encouraged to be bad in the name of profits (deregulated) that reporting on any of this would be best reserved for some hippie outlet like Mother Jones, not the respectable Wall Street Journal. Big scoops in finance usually involve mergers and acquisitions, company and exec failures -- going after anything else is cute idealism. (In fact, someone last night compared it to steroids and baseball -- you don't want to know where those home runs are coming from, you just want to enjoy the game).

Topps' 2009 Allen & Ginter baseball card set will include the usual mix of all-stars and utility players, with a special twist: Fraudsters like Bernie Madoff, Charles Ponzi and Enron will also be inserted in some packs as part of the "World's Biggest Hoaxes, Hoodwinks & Bamboozles" subset.

No word yet on whether Alex Rodriguez will be in the set as a regular baseball player or as a fraudster.