State Law

Douglass' depositors will automatically become depositors of Liberty Bank and Trust. Douglass' three Kansas City-area offices will reopen Monday as Liberty branches. On Saturday and Sunday, customers can access their money by writing checks or using their debit or ATM cards.

Liberty Bank and Trust also will buy about $55.7 million of Douglass' assets at book value, minus a $6.1 million discount, the FDIC said. The FDIC will keep about $2.8 million in assets to dispose of later.

The FDIC said that the transaction was the least costly option and estimated that the transaction's cost to its Deposit Insurance Fund is about $5.6 million.

Separately on Friday, Douglass reported that it had lost $1.3 million in the fourth quarter of 2007. During the first nine months of 2007, Douglass lost $1.1 million.

The 25-year-old bank -- the only one in metropolitan Kansas City owned by African-Americans -- lost $4.2 million in 2006.

Bank assets shrank by 10 percent, or $5.7 million, during the most recent quarter to $52.5 million.

In October, a proposed rescue collapsed when First Guaranty Bancshares Inc. of Hammond, La., backed out of a July agreement to buy Douglass.

In March 2006, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency cited Douglass for "unsafe and unsound banking practices."

Douglass had been without a CEO since January 2005, when Lester Johnson resigned.

Douglass is the first FDIC-insured bank to fail this year, the FDIC said, and the first in Missouri to fail since Kansas City-based Superior National Bank was closed April 14, 1994.

More information about the closing of Douglass is available on the FDIC's Web site or by calling the FDIC toll-free at 888-206-4662.