ROANOKE TIMES

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, December 28, 1993                   TAG: 9312280097
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: A-7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Knight-Ridder/Tribune
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Short


SETTLING BCCI CHARGES COSTS SAUDI FINANCIER $225 MILLION

The Federal Reserve confirmed Monday that a Saudi Arabian financier paid $225 million to settle charges that he conspired to steal from Bank of Credit and Commerce International depositors.

The agreement - reached jointly with the Fed and the office of Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau - settled the Fed's administrative charges and "resolved criminal charges" by the district attorney against Sheik Khalid Bin Mahfouz, his assistant Haroon Kahlon, and the National Commercial Bank, the Mahfouz family bank that serves the Saudi royal family, the Fed said.

The Fed said the settlement is the "single largest collection of penalties and restitution" it has undertaken.

The settlement includes $37 million in civil penalties and $188 million in restitution to pay former depositors, creditors and others who suffered losses following the collapse of BCCI. The bank was seized by regulators in 1991 when it appeared that billions of dollars in deposits had fraudulently disappeared.

Mahfouz also agreed to get prior Fed approval before working with any U.S. bank. Mahfouz and Kahlon also agreed to cooperate with the investigation of the BCCI scandal.



 by CNB