Yesterday, Bernard Madoff’s ex-finance chief gave a colorful testimony against his former colleagues in a federal court, explaining that as auditors closed in, Madoff instructed them to destroy years of forged account statements, and replace them with more credible forged account statements.

Account managers Annette Bongiorno, Joanne Crupi, operations director Daniel Bonventre, and computer programmers Jerome O’Hara and George Perez, all stand accused for their role in the Ponzi scheme which came crashing down five year ago.

Frank Dipascali, Madoff’s right-hand man, recounted how on one occasion, in order to satisfy an auditor, fake documents to verify trading activity were produced in a hurry, and Madoff aides took great pains to make the documents look authentic, Newsday reports:

When DiPascali left the auditor to retrieve the report, he said, he found O’Hara, Crupi and Perez “tossing it around like a medicine ball” and laughing hysterically. He asked why.

“They explained to me that the document should look used, and I should not bring a hot, warm piece of paper up to an auditor,” he testified. “They had put it in the refrigerator.”

Madoff did not go down gracefully either. Dipascali testified that when the con man realized a Florida-based investment firm that invested in Madoff, Avellino & Bienes, was being investigated for not registering promissory notes, he started swearing, “throwing himself around the office like a lunatic,” and “ranting and raving to himself about the idiocy” of the firm.

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Looking to make your first investment of 2013? This eBay user might just have an offer you can’t refuse: for $1,000, you can own a portion of imprisoned Ponzi schemer Bernie Madoff’s library! (Bidding ends Jan. 29.)

According to the seller (who has 99.1% positive feedback), the books, along with other various Madoff belongings, were purchased during the U.S. Marshal seizure auction of the Madoff’s property in 2011. Highlights of the 110-book collection? The Joys of Yiddish, The World Must Know: The History of the Holocaust, a few Saul Bellow titles, The Kennedy Women, and The Chronicles of Narnia seven-book set.

Carolyn Kellogg reports on the contents of the collection in the Los Angeles Times’ book blog, Jacket Copy:

And then there are the literary selections, along the lines of Moody’s “Purple America.” Stacks of Philp Roth. E.L. Doctorow’s “Billy Bathgate.” Collections of poems by Emily Dickinson, Lord Byron and Edna St. Vincent Millay. Books by Norman Mailer and Elie Wiesel. Jhuma Lahiri’s “The Interpreter of Maladies.” The stories of Wallace Stegner. And a book by Margaret Atwood still bearing a $6.98 bargain price sticker: “The Robber Bride.”

If books aren’t your thing, you can always drop $200 for one Crane’s correspondence card personalized with ‘Bernard L. Madoff,’ presumably on heavy card stock. Think wisely about which of your acquaintances is worthy of receiving that epic prank handwritten note.

The Bernard Madoff book collection: Rick Moody, Fyodor Dostoevsky [LA Times] BERNARD BERNIE MADOFF & RUTH PERSONAL 110 BOOK LIBRARY COLLECTION [eBay]

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• New York Mets owner Fred Wilpon settles his Madoff suit for $162 million.

• There goes Senator Chuck Schumer, riding his bike in the Prospect Park bike lane his wife opposed.

• Alice Cooper seriously needs a new shirt.

• Jason Segel + Adam Levine = BFF.

The post Daily Jewce: Mets’ Owner Settles Madoff Suit, Joseph Cedar Talks Filmmaking in Israel, and more appeared first on Jewcy.

• #VeryJewishOscars was actually a hashtag last evening,  Natalie Portman won for best actress, Aaron Sorkin won for being a great writer; Eli Wallach and Kirk Douglas made appearances, Steven Spielberg presented the final award and a bunch of other Jews showed up to movies biggest night.

• Bernie Madoff just wants a little bit of sympathy: ““How could I have done this?” he asks. “I was making a lot of money. I didn’t need the money. [Am I] a flawed character?” (Via New York Magazine)

• Mubarak can’t leave Egypt.

• They love their Jewish food in Alabama.

• A Hasidic rabbi urges his students to give up contact lenses.   Up next: Amar’e Stoudemire style sport goggles.

The post Daily Jewce: Sympathy For The Madoff, Jewish Oscars, Latkes In Alabama, Amar’e Stoudemire’s Possibly Unkosher Goggles And More appeared first on Jewcy.

• The Knesset Constitution, Law and Justice Committee approved a bill yesterday that calls for heavy fines to be imposed on Israeli citizens who initiate or incite boycotts against Israel.  Tablet brings up the all important Sabra hummus question.

• Holy Mount Zion, a soccer team in England’s all-Jewish Maccabi Southern Football League, has been suspended from league play for supposedly fielding non-Jewish players and lying that they were members of the Tribe.

• The bankers are guilty, but Bernie Madoff says the New York Mets knew nothing about his Ponzi scheme.

• They’re taking to the streets in Libya.

• A master of the Yiddish avant-garde returns.

• How about a little Serge Gainsbourg to start off your morning?

The post Daily Jewce: No More Boycotting Israel, Fake Jews Playing Soccer, Bernie And The Mets, A Yiddish Master and More appeared first on Jewcy.

• Remember to never do anything even remotely religious when visiting New Zealand, because they might freak out and haul you in for questioning.  Example: the guy who was arrested for performing the ritual of wrapping tefillin in an airport.  I guess the Kiwi cops weren’t hipped to the fact that the ancient Jewish custom isn’t something you see many suicide bombers doing.

• A husband in the clink and now a son in the ground: the Madoff family is over says Ruth Madoff.

• Roman Abramovich buys an island to store his art.

• Ben Greenman picks up on secret cables leaked from the North Pole.

• How did “Jewish” Jordan Farmer fare against his former team the Los Angeles Lakers?

The post Daily Jewce: New Zealand Tefillin Freakout, The Madoff Family Is Over, Ben Greenman Ruins Christmas, And More appeared first on Jewcy.

• A heartwarming tale about a “43-year-old college dropout from Los Angeles who says he made a lot of money in finance, became interested in Nazi memorabilia and ended up on an undercover odyssey where he posed as a neo-Nazi to befriend a former Waffen SS officer and recorded many of their conversations with the plan to someday expose the man’s role in the Third Reich.”

• Israeli hummus will continue to flow at Princeton University.

• The New York Mets are being sued by the trustee trying to recover money from the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme.

• They should have just called this “fake-ass Mark Zuckerbergs.”

• Natalie Portman sports a very literary purse at the Black Swan premiere.

The post Daily Jewce: Israeli Hummus Will Flow At Princeton, NY Mets Getting Sued, Natalie Portman’s Book Bag And More appeared first on Jewcy.

Not sure you’re headed to Midtown Manhattan for the Bernie Madoff auction today, but in case you are, keep an eye out on the library that’s being sold en bloc, that includes books by some good names like Philip Roth and Paul Auster.

Pretty good chance King Scumbag had some nice first editions and autographed books in his collection, but you might have to wade through the crap like John Grisham and the seventeen copies of “Screwing People Over For Dummies.”

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