BN Amro and Fortis banks are being sued in the US for their role in the Bernard Madoff investment scandal.

Irving Picard, the trustee in charge of winding up Madoff’s investment fund is taking legal action against the two Dutch banks and five other financial institutions: US-based Citibank and Merrill Lynch (now part of Bank of America); Natixis of France; Spain’s Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria (BBVA); and Japan’s Nomura.
Picard says the banks all received money from the investment funds even though they knew, or should have known, that fraud was involved.
One billion dollars
In total, Picard is suing the seven banks for over one billion dollars. ABN Amro is being sued for $270m and Fortis $230m.
A spokesman for ABN Amro, which is now state owned, told news agency ANP the bank had not yet seen the legal papers. ‘But we do now we will rigorously defend ourselves,’ he said.
Madoff was arrested in early December 2008 for running a pyramid scheme. He was sentenced in June 2009 to 150 years in prison.