Madoff investors' lawsuit against SEC thrown out

Reuters reports:

A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit by two of Bernard Madoff's former customers accusing the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission of negligence for failing to uncover the now-imprisoned swindler's Ponzi scheme.

U.S. District Judge Laura Taylor Swain in Manhattan said the plaintiffs, Phyllis Molchatsky and Steven Schneider, failed to show the SEC violated any statute or rule governing how it should have investigated Madoff prior to his December 2008 arrest.

"Scandalous and outrageous as plaintiffs' allegations are, plaintiffs fail to identify any specific, mandatory duty that the SEC violated in its numerous instances of sloppy, uninformed, irresponsible behavior," the judge wrote.

Why have an SEC?