The Tokyo District Public Prosecutor's Office questioned Tadashi Okuda, former chairman of Dai-Ichi Kangyo Bank, and former consultant Kuniji Miyazaki on June 27 over the bank's alleged loans to a "sokaiya" corporate racketeer.

Special investigators suspect that both Okuda and Miyazaki received information about loans to sokaiya Ryuichi Koike, sources close to the investigation said June 27. Okuda, 65, and Miyazaki, 67, resigned from their DKB posts June 13 after admitting that they had mingled with the late Rikiya Kojima, president of publishing house Gendai Hyoronsha and a known corporate racketeer thought to be Koike's mentor.

Okuda was DKB president under Miyazaki's chairmanship in 1995 when they were allegedly briefed on 17.8 billion yen in bank loans provided to Koike via a nonbank lending affiliate. On June 27, investigators were believed to have asked Okuda and Miyazaki to what degree they had been aware of, or involved in, the provision of bank loans to Koike, the bulk of which went sour.

Okuda has told an internal investigative team that he did not know loans had been given to Koike. Miyazaki has said that although he remembers receiving the reports, he cannot remember their contents, the sources said. The questioning followed the indictment June 26 of four former DKB officials and Koike on charges that they violated the Commercial Code, which bans corporations from giving favors to shareholders.

The four DKB executives indicted June 26 are Hiroshi Inotsume, 55, a former managing director, Tatsuo Shibuya, 52, a former chief of the general affairs department in charge of shareholders' meetings, and Michiyoshi Kusajima, 49, and Takushi Manabe, 48, both former deputy chiefs of general affairs department.