Other defendants settled over the years, including Bernard Madoff’s brother and former compliance officer Peter Madoff, who paid Picard $90 million after pleading guilty in a related criminal case. He’s serving a 10-year term. Peter Madoff’s daughter Shana Madoff, another compliance officer, was also dropped from the suit. Picard had accused the group of spending customer cash on credit card bills, vacations and to finance their own business ventures.

A separate suit against Madoff’s wife seeking more than $40 million has also been pending for years. Picard hasn’t rushed that case because Ruth Madoff turned over most of her assets to the government years ago. The trustee is nevertheless seeking a judgment in the full amount as part of any deal "in the event that any additional assets are ever uncovered or discovered in the future," Picard’s spokeswoman Amanda Remus said in an e-mail.

Revised Complaint

The revised complaint against the brothers will be "focused exclusively on their wrongdoing," including alleged fake trades and sham loans. Picard told the court and he’ll formally ask permission to file it in June.

Martin Flumenbaum represents the brothers’ estates. In court papers, he says they were already exonerated in a 2013 U.K. trial involving their father’s London-based subsidiary and that Picard is seeking "a second bite at the apple" by attempting to breathe new life into the U.S. case.

"The trustee had a full opportunity to litigate, in the U.K., the exact same factual allegations that he asserts here," Flumenbaum told the court last month. "The forum was fair, and he lost. He should not be permitted a do-over in this case."

London Lawsuit

The Madoff brothers, who were directors of a U.K. unit, were sued in London by the company’s British liquidator over their alleged liability related to transactions set up by their father.

The U.S. suit can go forward, Picard says, because he wasn’t part of the U.K. trial and his claims are different and far broader.

The father pleaded guilty to fraud and is serving a 150-year term. His claim that he had acted alone was challenged in a 2014 trial in New York where five of his closest employees were convicted of helping in the fraud for decades. His longtime finance chief, Frank DiPascali, pleaded guilty and testified that Mark and Andrew Madoff were complicit in the fraud, though they weren’t among the defendants.