Spookier Than We Thought

By JANICE CASTRO/

The army of investigators probing the corrupt Bank of Credit & Commerce has known for months that the CIA kept some accounts in First American Bank, B.C.C.I.'s Washington arm. It turns out that the CIA and First American were a lot closer than that. Government investigators now have proof that First American had long been the CIA's principal banker. Some of the more than 50 agency accounts uncovered at the bank date back to the 1950s. B.C.C.I. owned the CIA's bank for a decade. But since Reagan CIA Director William Casey ran a vast back-door operation during the 1980s, the full extent of B.C.C.I.'s relationship with the intelligence agency may never be known.

With reporting by Wendy Cole