Prosecutor Derides Bank Suspect

Lying Alleged In Testimony On $70 Million Theft Plot

June 23, 1989|By John Gorman.

Convicted swindler Armand Moore ``lied for a living`` and lied to the jury when he denied he masterminded a plot to steal $70 million from First National Bank of Chicago, a federal prosecutor charged Thursday.

``The man lied for a living and has done nothing but lie for the last 10 years, except for the time he spent in a federal prison,`` argued Assistant U.S. Atty. Jeffrey Stone.

``Everything he told you was a lie. His defense was an insult to this court and to you (the jury),`` Stone continued. As the prosecutor spoke, Moore sat at the defense table, smiling, resting his head on his left hand.

When Moore took the stand earlier in the trial, he told the jury how he had opened foreign bank accounts for people he never met in return for $500,000 he never received. He didn`t plot the theft, Moore said, it was Hershel Bailey.

Bailey, who was indicted last year along with Moore, had testified earlier that Moore hatched the plot in a series of telephone calls from Moore`s home in Detroit. Bailey has pleaded guilty.

On trial with Moore are Neal Jackson, Leonard Strickland, Ronald Carson and Otis Wilson. Besides Bailey, Gabriel Taylor, who worked in the funds transfer room at First National, pleaded guilty to participating in the scheme and testified against Moore and the others last week.

According to the government, Moore and the other defendants conspired to transfer $69.13 million to two European banks on the morning of Friday, May 13, 1988. Hours after the transfer, the government charges, Moore and Strickland went to Harris Trust and Savings Bank and Exchange National Bank to try to arrange to have $500,000 transferred back to Chicago from two Viennese banks, Creditanstalt and Focobank, Stone said.

Harris and Exchange declined to handle the transaction, said Stone, who is prosecuting the case with Scott Mendeloff.

The day after the money was transferred from First National, Moore went shopping, Stone told the jury.

``He was trying to spend the money before he got it,`` Stone charged.

``He was going to buy a Jaguar. He wanted an eight-bedroom, four-bath luxury suite at Lake Point Tower, and he was buying three houses in Detroit.`` Stone ridiculed Moore`s explanation of his buying expeditions.

`` `I wasn`t buying, I was just window-shopping,` he said. Everything he told you was a lie,`` Stone said.

The plot fell on its face before any of the defendants could get their hands on any of the money, Stone said. When First National opened on the following Monday and discovered the theft, the funds were frozen. Before the week was over, all the money had been transferred back to First National.

Moore`s attorney, Paul Wagner, argued that the jury should question the testimony of Bailey and Taylor, the First National employee who was the key to transferring the money. Wagner also argued that Moore had used his own name when he went to the banks.

``Was he attempting to hide something?`` Wagner asked.

Wagner also attempted to refute Stone`s contention that everything Moore said was a lie.

``Was he lying when he acknowledged these convictions?`` Wagner said.

Moore pleaded guilty in 1982 in Detroit to masterminding a scheme that bilked 10 charter jet service companies out of nearly $200,000 by setting up a phony bank in Chicago that issued bogus letters of credit.

When Moore was arrested in connection with the First National case, he was still on probation from the Detroit case after having served four years in prison, according to Stone.