TV’s ‘Keating 5’ Rivets Couple Who Lost Big : S&L; scandal: Television coverage fascinates retired Laguna Hills couple who saw their $100,000 investment in American Continental bonds vanish.

When Matthew and Alice Pobog turned on their television set Thursday to watch the opening of the Senate Ethics Committee hearing of the “Keating Five,” it was almost as if they were viewing a good detective story.

“If Agatha Christie had written a book about a swindler, she couldn’t have done a better job--and this is reality,” said the 67-year-old Pobog, a retired engineer living in Laguna Hills Leisure World, the senior citizens community.

It is the Pobogs’ real life story too because they lost $100,000 of their life’s savings by investing in American Continental Corp. bonds sold through their neighborhood thrift, Lincoln Savings & Loan.

They were not alone. About 20,000 Southern California investors lost nearly $200 million by investing in American Continental’s bonds. And the related failure of Lincoln is expected to cost taxpayers $2 billion.

Like many others, the Pobogs blame their losses on Charles H. Keating Jr., former chairman of American Continental, which owned Lincoln. And they blame the “Keating Five,” the five U.S. senators--including Sen. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.)-- who are accused of helping Keating fight an “all-out war” with federal regulators in exchange for campaign contributions.

“Mr. Keating was able to convince a number of senators to play his game,” Matthew Pobog said. “I don’t want anything from the government. I just don’t want to be robbed with the help of the government.”

The Keating Five hearings, which are being broadcast gavel-to-gavel on cable’s C-SPAN network, is the latest chapter in the Lincoln drama that the Pobog’s have watched unfold intently. They have newspaper stories clipped and piled in a drawer, and they said they were glued to televised House Banking Committee hearings earlier this year.

The Pobogs watched the afternoon session of Thursday’s Senate Ethics Committee hearing, and Matthew Pobog predicted that they would watch most of the future sessions too. He was especially impressed Thursday with special counsel Robert S. Bennett’s presentation.

However, he felt that there should have been more emphasis on the losses of the bondholders, like himself. Although angry at first about their large loss, the Pobogs now say they are trying to be more philosophical.

“We can’t live in regret,” said 70-year-old Alice Pobog. “We can’t live in fear.”

There was little of either when they bought the bonds in June, 1988, shortly after moving to Leisure World, a sprawling retirement community in Laguna Hills. They decided to transfer money from the sale of their Newport Beach home to the nearby Lincoln branch on Moulton Parkway.

A customer service representative told them about the American Continental bonds, which were paying 1% more than certificates of deposit. They agreed to speak to a representative from American Continental, who was sitting at another desk.

“He was a young man, persuasive,” Matthew Pobog said. “As a personality, he was quite wonderful.”

They decided that they could deposit the bonds at Lincoln and live off the interest. They were left with the impression that the bonds were insured. They signed the papers and took the prospectus home with them without reading the fine print.

It is not easy for the Pobogs to talk about their misfortune. They feel embarrassed about being duped.

“I feel like this is AA (Alcoholics Anonymous),” said Matthew Pobog, raising a hand in confession. “I was a fool.”