DC's venerable Riggs Bank ends ignominiously

Judge OKs $16M Plea Deal in Riggs Case :
"Justice Department prosecutors laid out a case in which, they said, Riggs officials aggressively courted foreign political figures to win their banking business, failed to exercise proper oversight and aided these customers' illegitimate uses of the bank."

Riggs Bank was founded in DC when Andrew Jackson was in the White House. It is scheduled to be absorbed by PNC of Pittsburgh, but not before settling a Treasury Department civil action for $25 million and a plea bargain in a criminal case with the Justice Department which resulted in a $16 million fine. For perspective, those fines total a bit over 5% of the selling price of the bank.

Long a prestigious institution in the Washington area, I can remember when Riggs was one of the few banks in the credit card business. This may not have been the only time the bank was involved in covering up some shady dealings, however. About 35 years or so ago, a Riggs teller conspired with her boyfriend to raid my father's account there. Dad only found out when he got a notice that a routine monthly debit to pay the mortgage on our house had to be declined for lack of funds. The bank promptly restored the misappropriated money to my father's account but declined to prosecute the teller and her accomplice because doing so would embarass the bank.