The brother of Bernard Madoff, the man behind the largest Ponzi scheme ever prosecuted in US history, is poised to plead guilty to criminal charges.
Peter Madoff, 66, was taken into custody at his lawyer's Manhattan office today, according to the FBI.
A court appearance was scheduled a few hours later.
The plea was to take place at the same courthouse where Peter Madoff's now-74-year-old brother was taken away in handcuffs after being sentenced to 150 years in prison in 2009 for cheating thousands of people out of billions of dollars.
The two are the only Madoff family members to face criminal charges.
Peter Madoff is agreeing to serve 10 years in prison for conspiracy and falsifying records and surrender his assets.
The agreement will let investigators show what they have learned about the Ponzi scheme since Bernard Madoff revealed in December 2008 that his investment business was a sham.
The government has used the co-operation of six former employees and associates of the Bernard L Madoff Investment Securities LLC to learn what went on inside the secretive business that caused almost 20 billion dollars to vanish, leaving only a few hundred million dollars where bogus financial statements claimed there was 65 billion dollars.
Peter Madoff kept firmly behind the scenes as Bernard Madoff provided the face of the investment firm that attracted rich and famous clients with too-good-to-be-true returns.
In his 2009 guilty plea, Bernie Madoff maintained that his brother had nothing to do with it - and for more than three years, his brother agreed.
Peter Madoff was the firm's top technocrat. He was credited with creating a computer trading system for the firm in the late 1970s and early 1980s that was considered groundbreaking at the time. He ran the daily trading operation, while his brother focused on the more secretive investment advisory arm.
When Bernie Madoff was arrested, Peter Madoff broke the news to Madoff Securities employees. Through lawyers, he denied any wrongdoing.
But the denial did not stop federal authorities from moving to freeze Peter Madoff's assets. He agreed not to dispose of his substantial fortune and promised to curtail his personal spending as the investigation moved forward. His living expenses were capped at 10,000 dollars a month.
A complaint filed in bankruptcy court by a court-appointed trustee alleged that the Madoff investment business had transferred more than 77 million dollars to Peter Madoff.