The U.S. Justice Department’s $4 billion fund for victims of Bernard Madoff’s epic Ponzi scheme is getting closer to making its first payout, more than four years after it was set up, Bloomberg News reported on Friday. The administrator of the Madoff Victim Fund, Richard Breeden, said in an update on his website that the Justice Department in early June had approved more than 35,000 petitions claiming total losses of more than $6.5 billion. The first round of checks should go out sometime this year, he said. “Approved petitioners should expect to receive notification of these decisions in the coming weeks,” he said.
