A small group of investors took Bernard Madoff to bankruptcy court onMonday, saying the disgraced financier bilked them out of nearly $64million.

A Manhattan judge cleared the way for the newly filed Chapter 7petition last week by granting a request from the same investors tolift a temporary order barring bankruptcy for Madoff. They had arguedthat a bankruptcy case was needed to protect their rights amid anongoing scramble to seize his assets.

Madoff,70, pleaded guilty last month to federal charges his secretiveinvestment advisory service actually was a multibillion Ponzi scheme inwhich he paid longtime clients with money from new ones. He is jailed,awaiting a June sentencing for charges that carry a sentence of up to150 years in prison.

Federal authorities already have begunforcing Madoff to forfeit property they allege was paid for by hisfraud. In addition, a court-appointed trustee is liquidating assetsfrom his securities firm to help play claims from thousands of burnedinvestors.

The investors who sought bankruptcy believe it was thebest way to make sure "all the property available would go to thevictims," their lawyer, Jonathan Landers, said Monday.

Theyinclude a general partnership in Florida that claims it lost $30.2million and another Madoff client who says he lost about $29 million inpersonal and charitable trust accounts. The claims are based on amountslisted in the last statements they received from Madoff — documentsinvestigators say were fictitious.

The State of New Mexico claims Dr. Ali Ghaffari and his pharmacist wife owned and operated the substandard and abusive Buena Vista Retirement Center in Clovis, and bilked the state through Medicaid fraud. The state also sued Dr. Ali Ghaffari Sr., and claims the Ghaffaris "caused egregious and ongoing resident harm, abuse, and neglect, and the grossly deficient living conditions at Buena Vista."
In its federal claim, the state says the Ghaffaris collected $4.9 million from Medicaid. It claims the family "knowingly caused and/or conspired to cause Buena Vista to submit bills to Medicaid for providing qualified nursing home services, despite knowing that in fact Buena Vista was not doing so. At all material times, defendants knowingly assisted one another and cooperated in submitting the false claims and accepting the payments received therefrom ... . defendants Ali Ghaffari and Linda Ghaffari personally benefited from the payments received from the Medicaid program."
The state demands penalties and treble damages for false claims, and other relief.

A man says Phoenix Country Club expelled him for objecting to its policy that bars women from the grill. Russell Brown, an attorney, says that after he expressed his views to other members, to the Arizona Women Lawyer's Association and The New York Times, the country club retaliated by expelling him and refusing to pay for the value of his membership.
Brown spoke at the Arizona Women's Lawyers Association monthly luncheon about men's grills and had previously notified William Maledon, then-Phoenix Country Club Board president, about his anticipated comments.
Brown claims that Maledon did not warn him about speaking on the topic. Brown also commented to a New York Times reporter on the issue, and was quoted as saying, "Most men are indifferent to the policy or are against it."
According to the Superior Court lawsuit, the country club board of directors attempted to intimidate Brown and any members who disagreed with "PCC's policy of excluding women from the Men's Grill." Brown claims this included amendments to the country club's etiquette policy that state that a member may be suspended or expelled for making derogatory comments to the media.
Brown received a letter expelling him from the country club due to multiple violations of its etiquette policy, for his contact with the Arizona Women's Lawyers Association and The New York Times, but he says the "real reason he was expelled from membership was in retaliation for expressing his views against PCC's discriminatory policy towards women." He was not given the opportunity to defend himself in front of board members before his expulsion.
He is represented by David J. Bodney and Peter S. Kozinets with Steptoe & Johnson in Phoenix.