Madoff won't attend son's funeral

In an attempt to dim the spotlight on his young grandchildren, swindler Bernard Madoff will not try to get a furlough from prison to attend his older son's funeral, his lawyer said yesterday.

Mark Madoff hanged himself in his Manhattan apartment last week as legal attempts to recoup the billions stolen by his father closed in on him. Although Mark Madoff wasn't accused of being a part of his father's Ponzi scheme, the bankruptcy trustee in the case said his father engineered transfers of millions of dollars to him and other family members before his arrest two years ago.

As of last evening, Mark Madoff's body still had not been claimed.

Bernard Madoff, sentenced to 150 years, will remain in the Butner Federal Correctional Center in North Carolina while the funeral takes place, said his attorney, Ira Lee Sorkin of Manhattan. "He will not be attending the funeral, out of consideration for the family," Sorkin said.

Sorkin said Madoff would take part in a private service for his son at Butner.

Mark Madoff's suicide will do little to change the scope of the effort to recover the money swindled by his father.

The law firm of bankruptcy trustee Irving Picard acknowledged Monday that litigation that included Mark Madoff will proceed against his estate.

Given the intense legal and public scrutiny of the case, experts said Picard has little choice but to do so. No matter what sympathy may exist for Mark Madoff's wife and children, experts say Picard still is obligated to return as much money as possible to the victims.

Lawrence Raful, dean of the Touro Law School in Central Islip, said a trustee appointed by a federal bankruptcy court has considerable discretion about how to proceed, but the high visibility of this case could lead him to be extra vigilant on behalf of Madoff's victims.

"The trustee is well aware of how many people are looking over his shoulder," Raful said. "The obligation is still there to collect as much as possible for the people who lost money."

Gina Rubel, president of Furia Rubel Communications, a Pennsylvania firm that specializes in public relations for lawyers, echoed that. "What is most important in this situation is that the law firm represent the best interest of their client regardless of the emotional implications of Mark Madoff taking his life," she said. "Attorneys take an oath to represent their clients' best interests no matter the emotional impact."