Talon Seeks Order for Madoff Trustee to Pay Jet Fees of $47,000

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Talon Seeks Order for Madoff Trustee to Pay Jet Fees of $47,000


By Erik Larson

May 20 (Bloomberg) -- Talon Air Inc. asked a bankruptcy judge to order the trustee liquidating Bernard Madoff’s defunct money-management firm to pay $47,217 owed for maintenance and servicing of a $25 million private jet that was used by Madoff.

The sum represents unpaid bills since Madoff’s Dec. 11 arrest, according to papers filed yesterday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan. Madoff owed $92,525 before his arrest, said Talon, which is based at Republic Airport in Farmingdale, New York.

The trustee, Irving Picard, hasn’t rejected Talon’s maintenance agreement with Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC, or BLMIS, the firm used by Madoff to perpetrate a $65 billion Ponzi scheme. Talon is a creditor in the case.

“It is unfair to movant to ask it to continue to perform under the management agreement without receiving compensation,” Talon said in the filing. The company asked U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Burton Lifland to give Picard a June 12 deadline to assume or reject the contract for the Embraer Legacy 600 aircraft.

Madoff, 71, pleaded guilty to a massive fraud in March and faces as many as 150 years in prison when he is sentenced next month. Picard has been searching for assets and suing some Madoff investors for a total of more than $13 billion to help repay thousands of Madoff victims.

Madoff bought a 50 percent interest in the $25 million aircraft in March 2008 through a company called BLM Air Charter LLC, according to the filing. The other half is owned by BDG Aircharter Inc., Talon said.

Kevin McCue, a Picard spokesman, didn’t immediately respond to an e-mail message seeking comment yesterday.

The case is In re Bernard L. Madoff, 09-11893, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).

To contact the reporter on this story: Erik Larson in New York at elarson4@bloomberg.net.