[ by Melanie Gretchen ]

Longtime Bernie Madoff employee pled guilty last week to falsifying records, a conspiracy that a individual acknowledged had begun in the 1970s.  Yet, the former controller, who worked for no employer other than Bernie, claims that he can only vouch for the fraudulent entries, and not for any other aspect of the firm's business.  This includes the possibility that Bernie's multi-billion-dollar Ponzi scheme began in the '70s, along with the erroneous accounting entries.

  [C-I Note:  Now, Mr. Prosecutor, try and prove I knew otherwise.  Limited guilty pleas also were submitted by Bernie's brother Peter and the outside auditor (who basically said, "I was a lousy auditor - so sue me."]

The Tip of the Iceberg?  Irwin Lipkin, 74, told a Manhattan federal court judge that for years he fudged the books on Madoff's orders.  "While working for Bernie Madoff, I made accounting entries in financial records that I knew were inaccurate."  However, the fraud - as he understood it - stopped there, he said:

 "At no time before I retired was I ever aware that Mr. Madoff or anyone else at the company was engaged in the Ponzi scheme reported in the media."

Irwin Lipkin joined Madoff's firm in 1964 - as the first Madoff employee who was not a Madoff family member.  He retired in 1998 - 10 years before Bernie turned himself in - yet, he illegally was retained on the Madoff payroll and continued to receive salary and  benefits without having to work.

Prosecutor Julian Moore told judge Laura Taylor Swain that "as early as the mid 1970s" Lipkin had started changing the financial records of accounts at Madoff's direction.  To date, more than a dozen people have been charged in the case.  In court on Thursday, Lipkin pointed to 1 of the 5 who have pled not guilty in the case and are awaiting trial.

Annette Bongiorno, he said, had helped him falsify trading records.  In her defense, a lawyer for Mr. Bongiorno, said "it saddens us that the government has insisted on prosecuting an elderly, very sick man, who ought to be left alone to die in his bed."

In the Family.   Lipkin, who signed a plea agreement with federal prosecutors, pled guilty to charges of conspiracy to commit securities fraud and falsifying documents. He faces up to 10 years in prison. His son, Eric Lipkin, who also worked for Madoff, pled guilty in 2011 to criminal charges of bank fraud and charges that he reported people were Madoff employees so they could receive retirement benefits.

Madoff, also 74, was charged in December 2008 with a decades-long fraud that the government originally estimated at as much as $64.5 billion.  He pled guilty in March 2009 and is currently serving a 150-year prison sentence.

The case is U.S. v. O'Hara et al, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, No. 10-cr-228.

For further details, go to [Reuters, 11/8/12].