The New York Post says that inmates say Bernie Madoff has been talking about how he stashed away $9 billion through three other people...

Ponzi king Bernard Madoff is telling fellow jailbirds that he secretly funneled $9 billion in swiped funds to three people before he was nabbed, an inmate told The Post.

Madoff says that his partner in crime Frank DiPascali knows who the recipients are -- and that he suspects DiPascali is using that information to cut a better deal with the feds, according to the inmate at the medium-security prison in Butner, NC.

"I think it was personal friends," the inmate said of the recipients of the mega-bucks.

DiPascali, 52, pleaded guilty last year to 10 felonies in connection with helping Madoff swindle investors out of more than $60 billion at his Manhattan financial firm.

Madoff, 72, is serving a life sentence, but DiPascali has reportedly been trying to avoid that fate by cooperating with prosecutors -- who argued strenuously for his release from jail pending sentencing despite a judge's initial reluctance to grant bail.

DiPascali remains locked up awaiting sentencing, unable to post a $10 million bond.

DiPascali's lawyer, Marc Mukasey, did not return a call seeking comment.

The Manhattan US Attorney's Office, which is prosecuting DiPascali, and Madoff's lawyer, Ira Lee Sorkin, had no comment on the inmate's claim about DiPascali.

The inmate, who has witnessed the arch swindler's daily routine, also detailed how Madoff began attending sessions with a female prison psychiatrist last year after becoming depressed about a tell-all published in August by his former mistress, Sheryl Weinstein.

"He was having problems with his wife [Ruth]" over the book's revelations, the inmate said.

"He felt she might leave him."

The rest of the article basically just describes Madoff's prison conditions with some interesting anecdotes...

I find that last line in the quote above to be a bit ironic. He was worried his wife would leave him, while he is serving a 150 year sentence. There is nothing really for her to leave (not that that means he doesn't love her and wouldn't fear such a thing, just the irony made me chuckle)...