Five former employees of Ponzi schemer Bernard Madoff, whose financial scheme cost his clients billions of dollars, have been found guilty of conspiracy and fraud in a US federal court.
Manhattan US Attorney Preet Bharara said that the five former workers face prison sentences after the jury unanimously found each of them guilty of being involved in Madoff's scheme, which Bharara called the "largest-ever Ponzi scheme".
"These defendants each played an important role in carrying out the charade, propping it up, and concealing it from regulators, auditors, taxing authorities, lenders and investors," Bharara said.
"The scheme these defendants helped perpetrate cost innumerable investors their life savings. Now it likely will cost the defendants their freedom." Bharara said that scheme began as early as the 1970s.
Madoff was arrested in 2008 after his business, which relied on ever-larger investments of new cash to pay clients cashing out, fell apart amid the global financial crisis. While the books showed $US65 billion ($A71.36 billion) in deposits, the actual amount was only $US300 million, according to prosecutors.
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Madoff confessed to running the fraud, which cost investors about $US17 billion.
He was prosecuted, convicted and sentenced to a 150-year prison term in 2009. His clients ranged from celebrities to ordinary savers.
Earlier this year, JPMorgan Chase agreed to pay a $US1.7 billion fine for failing to report suspicious activities by Madoff.
