A jury acquitted Washington lawyer Robert Altman on Saturday of a multimillion-dollar fraud that prosecutors said allowed the outlaw Bank of Credit and Commerce International to take over a U.S. bank.
Jurors found Altman, 46, innocent of four counts of engaging in a scheme to defraud bank regulators and of submitting false records for filing with regulators.Prosecutors had charged the deceit allowed BCCI, whose customers included dictators and drug barons, to secretly gain ownership of a major U.S. bank, First American Bankshares Inc. of Washington. The defense said BCCI never controlled the bank.
Five other counts accusing Altman of engaging in a conspiracy with BCCI, taking bribes and falsifying business records had been dismissed earlier.
Both the jury and members of Altman's family erupted in tears as the first of the verdicts was read in court early Saturday evening after a tense wait.
Altman's wife, actress Lynda Carter, leaped into her husband's arms moments after the jurors were excused.
"My husband has been innocent all along and 12 people just proved that," said Carter, who played "Wonder Woman" on television. "The only fraud that was committed was by the DA's office in New York."
A beaming Altman thanked everyone in the courtroom.
"This is a prosecution that never should have been brought," he said. "The government put on a five-month trial and we put on a five-minute defense."
After the acquittal, Altman, his family and lawyers met the jurors in a courtroom hallway, and a noisy, jubilant scene ensued. Most jurors approached the Altman family or lawyers and hugged them. The family profusely thanked the racially diverse, eight-woman and four-man jury.
"This man was innocent from the start, from the very first witness," said one of the jurors, Internal Revenue Service employee Ricardo Palacio. "There were no doubts in my mind."
The jury's forewoman, who declined to be named, offered a curt statement about the prosecution's case: "I felt insulted."
The acquittal came after a trial that began in March and included testimony from 45 witnesses. Entered into evidence were hundreds of documents describing in painstaking detail BCCI's role in the 1982 takeover of First American Bankshares Inc. by wealthy Middle Eastern investors.
The verdict marks an embarrassing setback for the Manhattan district attorney's office, which was widely credited with breaking open the international banking scandal.
"We accept the verdict, of course. Justice has been served," District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau said in a statement released Saturday night.
"However, our investigation of BCCI continues," Morgenthau said.
Indicted with Altman in July 1992 were his law partner, former Defense Secretary Clark Clifford.
Clifford, a confidant to Presidents Truman, Kennedy, Johnson and Carter, is recuperating from heart surgery and was determined to be too ill to stand trial. Reached at his home in Bethesda, Md., Clifford said he felt vindicated by the jury's ruling.
"It is more than just the end of a trial, it is the end of 21/2 years of a real nightmare," Clifford said. "It is a total rejection of the action by the district attorney."
Clifford and Altman were attorneys for BCCI, the Middle Eastern investors of First American and senior executives at First American.
Prosecutors said Altman deceived state and federal regulators by concealing and distorting the role BCCI played in the 1982 takeover and subsequent operations of First American.
But defense attorneys argued Altman was honest all along and that he was made a scapegoat for bank regulators who sought to shift the blame for their inability to detect BCCI's financial links to First American.
They said regulators were told about BCCI's role as financial adviser to First American but didn't object until inquiries from Congress and the media.
"BCCI got no special treatment at First American," said Altman's attorney, Gustave Newman.
Newman also said there was nothing improper about Clifford and Altman's purchase of stock in First American's privately held parent company, Credit and Commerce American Holdings.
Altman made a $1.5 million profit and Clifford reaped $3 million in the securities, which they acquired with a loan from BCCI. The loan was repaid in full with interest, according to testimony.
Prosecutors charged that the loan, stock sale and $16.8 million in legal fees that Clifford and Altman charged BCCI and First American amounted to BCCI bribes.