MIDDLE ATLANTIC
American Partners Bank of Bethesda, Md., has hired R. Hugh Rial Jr. as president.
Mr. Rial was the president and chief executive at the $121 million-asset Colombo Bank of Rockville, Md. Earlier he had the same jobs at F&M Bank Maryland of Bethesda, which BB&T Corp. of Winston-Salem, N.C., bought in 2001.
Stuart McFarland, a former Fannie Mae and GE Capital Mortgage Services executive, is the chairman and chief executive of the $56 million-asset American Partners and its holding company, Federal City Bancorp. He led an investor group that bought the bank, then named Assurance Partners Bank, last year from the National Association of Mutual Insurance Cos., which had organized it to serve members and employees.
First State Bank of Cranford, N.J., which opened for business last month, has hired William T. Heath as its president and chief executive officer.
Mr. Heath was a senior vice president and a senior market manager at Sovereign Bank, where he worked for eight years. Before that he had been a senior relationship manager in the business banking division at Fleet Bank, which Bank of America Corp. bought in 2004. He has 35 years of banking experience.
First state also hired Theodore Kest as its chief financial and operations officer and Douglas Conover as its chief lending officer.
Mr. Kest, who has more than 30 years of New Jersey banking experience, was the chief financial and operating officer and the secretary of Pascack Community Bank of Westwood, his employer of four years.
Before that he had worked various jobs at United Jersey Bank, which during his time there became Summit Bank. (The parent company bought Summit's parent in 1996 and took its name; FleetBoston Financial Corp. bought Summit in 2001.)
Mr. Conover was a senior vice president and a regional executive at Sovereign Bank, for which he had worked since 2001. Before that he had been senior vice president for commercial lending at First Washington State Bank of Windsor, N.J.
