New York financier Bernie Madoff is not the only crook whose misdeeds have been left high and dry as decades of financial good fortune ebbs. A California surrogacy broker has been accused of fraud and theft after many clients paid hundred of thousands of dollars without receiving a baby. And surrogate mothers also claim that B Coming, a Beverly Hills company owned by Rosa Balcazar, had not compensated them properly. According to the Los Angeles Times, the aggrieved clients include six couples from Spain and one from the US whose US$500,000 disappeared; a Taiwanese man who recovered $100,000 after a lawsuit; and a Kentucky couple who lost $16,000.

Surrogacy brokers may be the least regulated part of the multi-billion dollar artificial reproduction industry in the US. "If you're going to sell hot dogs, you need a permit," one experienced broker told the Times. "If you're going to run a surrogacy agency out of your garage, you don't."

B Coming has had a chequered history as a business. Ms Balcazar filed for bankruptcy in 2007, but was turned down, for unspecified reasons. In October last year the state government revoked its business licence because it had failed to pay taxes. In November, an insurance company sued it for fraud, misrepresentation and breach of contract. It wants to recover more than $500,000 in bogus insurance payouts.

This follows another distressing case of two related California companies dealing in surrogacy. According to the LA Times, $2 million could be missing. Pregnant surrogate mothers have not been paid, and couples who gave their life savings to SurroGenesis and its partner, the Michael Charles Independent Financial Holdings Group, may have lost it all. ~ Los Angeles Times, Mar 21; Los Angeles Times, Mar 26