BankAmerica named in suit about BCCI.

BankAmerica Named In Suit About BCCI

LOS ANGELES -- A depositor in the Bank of Credit and Commerce International filed a class-action racketeering lawsuit against BankAmerica Corp. and the emirate of Abu Dhabi, which he said were the failed institution's founders, and two international accounting firms.

Akahter Hamid, who had deposits of $140,000 with BCCI, filed suit in federal court in Los Angeles.

The accounting firms named were Price Waterhouse and Ernst & Young. Individuals named were Agha Hasan Abedi, Swaleh Naqvi, and Sheik Zayed Nahayan, the ruler of Abu Dhabi.

A spokeswoman for BankAmerica said she could not comment directly on the suit because she had not seen the legal papers.

In a response to a similar suit filed recently in San Francisco, the spokeswoman said BankAmerica had stated that it had no suspicion or knowledge of illegal activity by BCCI.

As to the allegation that BankAmerica had helped found BCCI, she said that BankAmerica provided some initial funding in 1972 and held 30% of BCCI by 1975. It sold the stock by June 1980, she said.

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