NEW YORK— Prosecutors want evidence of romantic and sexual relationships excluded from the upcoming trial of some of Ponzi king Bernard Madoff’s subordinates.
Prosecutors say in court papers filed in federal court in New York late Thursday that four of five defendants and several government witnesses were at times seeing each other romantically or were sexually involved with one another. They say one defendant was in a love triangle with Madoff himself.
The government says that over the course of Madoff’s multi-decade, multibillion-dollar fraud, a number of his employees and customers were dating or having affairs.
The government says it seeks to exclude the evidence from a fraud trial set to start Oct. 7. All five defendants pleaded not guilty Friday to charges in a rewritten indictment.