Corporate Restructuring and Bankruptcy partner Philip Bentley's article "Legal Battle Looms for Madoff Early Exiters," appeared in the January 7th issue of The Deal. The article discusses the basis of lawsuits that many investors who withdrew their money from Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC or other Madoff vehicles before the fraud was discovered, will face. The court appointed trustee of Madoff Investment Securities is expected to sue those investors for not only any profits they received, but also for their investment principal. The article points out that the basis for the trustee's claim will likely be that those who withdrew their money up to 90 days before the fraud was uncovered, and as far back as 2002, were "preferred" over those who did not redeem. The article goes on to discuss the ruling in the Bayou Group bankruptcy as the precedent that the trustee will likely use to justify the lawsuits. In the case of Bayou, the court required investors who redeemed years before Bayou's collapse to return their profits and principal investment on the basis that those investors should have been aware of the warning signs of fraud, even if they did not have knowledge of the fraud. Bentley points out that any former Madoff investors who are sued under these circumstances can question the wisdom of penalizing investor savvy, as well as contend that they had the legal right to withdraw their money.