Dead Bridgeport banker routinely hid bad loans from federal regulators, trial shows

John F. Gembara is dead, but the former head of Washington Federal Bank for Savings has been the overriding presence so far in the first trial to focus heavily on the Bridgeport bank’s failure. (Provided)

John F. Gembara took over the small Bridgeport bank that his father and grandfather had run for decades, and he ran it into the ground.

That much already was clear from the government-ordered shutdown of Washington Federal Bank for Savings, one of the rare failures in recent years of an American bank.