Madoff guilty plea expected; trustee's found only $1B so far

NEW YORK -- Bernard Madoff is expected to plead guilty to 11 criminal charges with a combined maximum penalty of 150 years in prison, enough to all but ensure the disgraced financier dies behind bars, his attorneys said Tuesday.

He also faces mandatory restitution to thousands of investors victimized in a decades-long investment scam and billions of dollars in fines.

IN-DEPTH:Prosecutor's press release | The charges | Sentencing guidelines

The announcements came in a court hearing at which Madoff — a onetime respected Nasdaq chairman now reviled as the mastermind of one of the largest financial scams in history — waived potential legal conflicts involving lead defense attorney Ira Lee Sorkin.

Sorkin, asked by U.S. District Judge Denny Chin whether Madoff would plead guilty at a plea proceeding set for Thursday, replied, "I think that is a fair expectation."

Chin, noting that prosecutor Marc Litt said "there is no plea agreement with the defendant," stressed that the 70-year-old money manager would be required to plead guilty to all 11 counts of securities fraud, investment adviser fraud, mail fraud, wire fraud, money laundering, false statements, perjury, false filings and theft from an employee benefit plan.

The charges were detailed in a 25-page document known as a criminal information, unexpectedly filed by prosecutors in advance of Thursday's hearing. The filing outlined an alleged scam in which Madoff lured hedge funds, pension funds, charities, celebrities and ordinary investors worldwide with eerily steady reports of positive returns and guarantees of 46% annual gains for certain clients.

But instead of pursuing the complex stock- and options-trading investment strategy promoted to investors, prosecutors charged that Madoff ran his investment business as "a massive Ponzi scheme" in which most investors' money was used to pay others.

He was also charged with taking at least $250 million as commissions during the last six years and using the money to support separate businesses that handled proprietary stock trading and matched stock buyers with sellers. Prosecutors also alleged that Madoff and others, who were not identified, received millions of dollars in benefits.