State Bank (Stella, NE)

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MILD CENSURE OF LUIKART IS GIVEN

Probers Find Failure to Protect Depositors Fully—Oppose Campaign Solicitation — Deplore Duplication.

Criticism of the state bank receivership administration for failure to protect fully the interests of depositors in state banks and for using money taken from funds of failed banks and soliciting contributions from employes of the receivership division to promote the political candidacy of former Governor Charles W. Bryan is expressed in the report of the special accountants employed by State Auditor Fred C. Ayres, in its report delivered to the legislature Friday morning.

The report, signed by Ellsworth L. Fulk as chief examiner, concurred in by all but one of his associates in the probe, mildly censures E. H. Luikart, former state bank receiver, for certain transactions connected with the affairs of the failed State bank of Stella, in which Luikart and his wife were stockholders.

The house referred the report to its banking committee and Rep. Mason Hyde, vice chairman, called a meeting of the committee for Friday afternoon. The house adopted a resolution by Rep. Ed Lusienski calling on the committee to report back promptly.

Article Text

MILD CENSURE OF LUIKART IS GIVEN

Probers Find Failure to Protect Depositors Fully—Oppose Campaign Solicitation — Deplore Duplication.

Criticism of the state bank receivership administration for failure to protect fully the interests of depositors in state banks and for using money taken from funds of failed banks and soliciting contributions from employes of the receivership division to promote the political candidacy of former Governor Charles W. Bryan is expressed in the report of the special accountants employed by State Auditor Fred C. Ayres, in its report delivered to the legislature Friday morning.

The report, signed by Ellsworth L. Fulk as chief examiner, concurred in by all but one of his associates in the probe, mildly censures E. H. Luikart, former state bank receiver, for certain transactions connected with the affairs of the failed State bank of Stella, in which Luikart and his wife were stockholders.

The house referred the report to its banking committee and Rep. Mason Hyde, vice chairman, called a meeting of the committee for Friday afternoon. The house adopted a resolution by Rep. Ed Lusienski calling on the committee to report back promptly.

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The report, signed by Ellsworth L. Fulk as chief examiner, concurred in by all but one of his associates in the probe, mildly censures E. H. Luikart, former state bank receiver, for certain transactions connected with the affairs of the failed State bank of Stella, in which Luikart and his wife were stockholders.

The house referred the report to its banking committee and Rep. Mason Hyde, vice chairman, called a meeting of the committee for Friday afternoon. The house adopted a resolution by Rep. Ed Lusienski calling on the committee to report back promptly.

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Dictation Cited.

The receivership administration is criticised for trying to keep large depositors out of meetings of failed bank creditors, in certain instances; for forcing bank officials to retire and putting men of its own selection in charge who afterward put through questionable transactions; and for the policy of having depositors' committees appointed by the receivership division, instead of allowing the depositors themselves to select one or more representatives.

A particularly flagrant case, as viewed by the examiners, was that of the State bank of Stella, where E. H. Luikart, state bank superintendent, and George W. Woods, his former deputy, compelled Robert Dynan to retire as president of the bank, while it was still being operated, and put W. H. Rhodes, a man of their own selection, in charge at $200 a month.

Later, the report says, Rhodes used part of the money obtained from a $20,000 RFC loan to the Stella institution to pay off a note for $16,250 to a bank at Falls City which he had personally signed some time previously, borrowing that amount of money which was used to meet a 50 per cent assessment on certain stockholders in the Stella bank.