Impoundment

Prosecutors probing Bernard L. Madoff's massive fraud are determined to leave his wife with almost nothing after telling a Manhattan court that they consider more than $100 million in assets, most of it listed in her name, to be the fruits of her husband's crimes. The government even included a $39,000 Steinway piano and $65,000 in silverware, both owned by Ruth Madoff, in items it said it would try to force the Madoffs to forfeit. The list was in a three-page document filed in U.S.

A bankruptcy judge in New York has frozen the assets of Beverly Hills money manager Stanley Chais, who is accused of funneling hundreds of millions of his clients' dollars to a Ponzi scheme operated by disgraced financier Bernard L. Madoff. The order, signed Wednesday by U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Burton R. Lifland, prohibits Chais from accessing funds held at Goldman Sachs, City National Bank or any other institution. The order stands until an Oct. 22 hearing, at which the freeze could be extended.

Somehow, some way, Chris Burden and the Beverly Hills Gagosian Gallery aim to acquire 100 gold bars, combined value about $3.3 million, in the very near future. What's in question is whether they'll cop that bling -- needed for Burden's latest piece, "One Ton, One Kilo" -- in time for its scheduled Saturday opening at the Gagosian Gallery in Beverly Hills. The gold bars originally purchased for the exhibit have been frozen under an order by federal authorities. Reuters reported last week that Gagosian bought the gold in January from a company owned by R. Allen Stanford, the Texas billionaire accused of perpetrating an $8 billion financial fraud.

The state Department of Natural Resources has seized more than two dozen logs it says a timber crew featured on the History Channel's reality show "Ax Men" illegally salvaged. Chief enforcement officer Larry Raedel says officers served a search warrant on S&S Aqua Logging to retrieve timber the company had pulled from the Hoquiam River. Raedel says the company didn't have a permit to salvage those logs, and officers were tipped off after watching the show.

A judge extended a temporary freeze on the assets of Peter Madoff, brother of jailed swindler Bernard Madoff, but agreed that he could have $10,000 a month in expenses. New York State Supreme Court Justice Stephen Bucaria, ruling in a civil lawsuit against Peter Madoff on suburban Long Island, said he must also preserve all records and pay attorney fees. The lawsuit over $478,000 in inheritance money lost to the Madoff fraud charged that Peter Madoff, as chief compliance officer of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, had full knowledge of the alleged Ponzi scheme.

Federal authorities Thursday moved to seize an array of U.S.-based properties, bank accounts and religious sites that they charged in court documents were funneling money to an Iranian bank involved in that country's suspected nuclear weapons program. Prosecutors sought the forfeiture of assets that included Islamic centers and mosques in California, Maryland, New York City and Houston, as well as land in Virginia. They also took steps to seize financial control of a 36-story office tower at 650 Fifth Ave. in Manhattan that they said was part of a business empire controlled by the Alavi Foundation.

Drive without a license, lose your car. It's that simple under a pilot program launched Monday in south Orange County and aimed at chronic traffic offenders who continue to get behind the wheel after their licenses are suspended. The California Highway Patrol has joined forces with prosecutors and judges at Municipal Court in Laguna Niguel to impound the vehicles of these drivers and sell the cars at auction. "We tell them not to drive, they drive anyway," said Supervising Deputy Dist. Atty.

As their home-building empire began crumbling, brothers Alfred and James Baldwin at least were able to look to their private estates in tightly guarded Emerald Bay for sanctuary. It's the Baldwin Co., after all, that's been in bankruptcy for 13 months, not the brothers. But the Baldwins' sanctuary was invaded last week as Orange County marshals hauled an estimated $1 million worth of artwork and antiques out of the brothers' side-by-side homes to help satisfy a $2.

Fifteen tons of illegal fireworks--about five to six times the amount of explosives used in the catastrophic Oklahoma City and Saudi Arabian bombings--were recovered by sheriff's deputies Friday at a public storage facility in Gardena. Lt. John Martin of the L.A. County Sheriff Department's Century station detective bureau said the confiscation followed raids Thursday night at homes in the Watts area and East Los Angeles. He said two suspects were arrested during those raids.

Upholding the broad reach of the government's forfeiture power, the Supreme Court ruled Monday that it is not "double punishment" for prosecutors to seize a criminal's house and assets after he has been sent to prison.