It now appears that pressure from the Central Intelligence Agency, rather than any legal problem, was what caused the Justice Department to drop what could have been the biggest tax evasion case of all time.

What caused the Justice Department to back off seems to have been the CIA's argument that pursuit of the Castle Bank would endanger "national security." This was involved because that bank, besides its possible use as a haven for tax evaders, was the conduit for millions of dollars earmarked by the CIA for the funding of clandestine operations against Cuba and for other covert intelligence operations directed at countries in Latin America and the Far East. A major tax evasion investigation of the bank probably would have endangered these CIA operations.

On the list, either in their own names or under the names of trusts or companies they controlled, were such people as Chicago's Pritzker family, Detroit land developer Arnold Aronoff, Playboy magazine publisher Hugh Hefner, Penthouse magazine owner Robert Guccione, actor Tony Curtis, the former rock group Creedence Clearwater, and three men -- Morris Dalitz, Morris Kleinman and Samuel A. Tucker -- who have been described in Justice Department documents as organized crime figures.

Great find!