The Madoff Files: A Chronicle of SEC Failure

Washington's top cop for Wall Street, hamstrung by bureaucracy and inexperienced investigators, failed to thoroughly pursue multiple warnings about Bernard L. Madoff's multibillion-dollar Ponzi scheme, according to a scathing new critique of the Securities and Exchange Commission by its internal watchdog.

The report, issued Wednesday by the commission's inspector general, offers the first detailed examination of one of the agency's most public embarrassments.