Five ex-Madoff employees lose U.S. appeal of convictions
By Nate Raymond
NEW YORK (Reuters) - A U.S. appeals court on Wednesday upheld the convictions of five former employees of Bernard Madoff's firm who prosecutors said helped their boss conceal his multibillion-dollar Ponzi scheme for years.
The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York rejected arguments by the ex-employees' lawyers challenging various lower-court rulings and the sufficiency of the evidence presented during their six-month trial.
Back-office director Daniel Bonventre, portfolio managers Annette Bongiorno and Joann Crupi, and computer programmers Jerome O'Hara and George Perez also lost a challenge to what they called a racial aspect of a federal prosecutor's closing argument.
Lawyers for some of the defendants expressed disappointment with the ruling, which will ensure their clients remain in prison.
"These defendants were victims of Madoff's misuse of his iconic status and are paying for it with more than just money," said Andrew Frisch, a lawyer for Bonventre.
The five employees were among 15 people who pleaded guilty or were convicted at trial in connection with Madoff and his firm, Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC.
Madoff, 77, is serving a 150-year prison term after pleading guilty in 2009 to running a scheme that cost investors an estimated $17 billion or more in principal.
Prosecutors said the five employees knowingly propped up Madoff's fraud by creating fake documents and backdating trades.
The five employees were tried together and found guilty in 2014 on charges ranging from securities fraud to bank fraud to tax fraud.
Bonventre is serving a 10-year sentence while Crupi and Bongiorno were given six-year terms and O'Hara and Perez were sentenced to 2-1/2 years.
On appeal, the defendants had challenged what they called improper statements that a prosecutor, Randall Jackson, made at the close of trial invoking the civil rights movement in asking a mostly black jury to find five white employees guilty.
Jackson, who is black and now in private practice, had asked jurors to approach their deliberations with the same "courageous approach" as Constance Baker Motley, a civil rights lawyer who became the first black woman federal judge in 1966.
While the appellate court said Jackson's "choice of subject was peculiar and his rhetoric needlessly grandiose, it did not constitute severe misconduct."
Eric Breslin, Crupi's lawyer, expressed disappointment with the ruling, saying he believes "some aspects of the government's conduct prejudiced Ms. Crupi."
The case is U.S. v. O'Hara, 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, No. 14-4714.
(Editing by Bill Trott and Matthew Lewis)
