Clifford Due to Make Final Plea to Avoid Indictment : BCCI Scandal: His lawyers are expected to cite former defense secretary’s ill health. Prosecutor’s decision likely to come this week.

Lawyers for Clark M. Clifford, a former defense secretary and one of the most influential lawyers of his era, are expected to make a final plea today to prevent his indictment in the Bank of Credit & Commerce International scandal, sources close to the investigation said Monday.

New York Dist. Atty. Robert Morgenthau hopes to make a final decision this week on whether to charge Clifford and his longtime partner and protege, Robert A. Altman, with conspiring to defraud the Federal Reserve Board by concealing BCCI’s hidden control of Washington’s largest bank, two sources close to the investigation said.

An indictment of Clifford and Altman would elevate the BCCI scandal to a new level in the United States and put increased pressure on a federal grand jury here that is also investigating the two men.

“We are close to a final decision,” a source familiar with Morgenthau’s inquiry said.

Clifford and Altman have been under state and federal investigation for months as a result of their joint roles as lawyers for BCCI and chief executives of First American Bankshares, the Washington bank that federal officials concluded last year was secretly owned by BCCI.

Clifford and Altman have maintained their innocence in appearances before Congress and in interviews with the press. Attempts to reach their lawyers, Robert Bennett and Carl Rauh, on Monday were unsuccessful.

One of the sources said that lawyers for the men are scheduled to meet in New York today with Morgenthau and his top prosecutor on the case, John Moscow. They hope to persuade the prosecutors not to bring the charges.

Lawyers for the 85-year-old Clifford have argued to prosecutors that his health is fragile and he might not survive the stress of a criminal indictment. He had a heart attack more than a decade ago and his lawyers have told prosecutors that he suffers from heart disease. Sources said doctors have recommended that he undergo open heart surgery but he has declined, they said, hoping to first clear his name.

In addition to the powerful Washington lawyers, one of the sources said that charges are also under consideration against other American lawyers and two of BCCI’s major foreign stockholders.

Officials of BCCI, which was seized by regulators worldwide a year ago, pleaded guilty to racketeering and other charges in federal court here last January. Since then, the bank’s receivers have provided hundreds of pages of documents to investigators for Morgenthau and the Justice Department. In addition, Morgenthau has taken testimony from some key former BCCI insiders.

However, sources said there has been a strong debate within the New York prosecutor’s office over whether there is sufficient evidence to indict Clifford and Altman.

The key to the case would be whether prosecutors could prove that the two lawyers knew that BCCI secretly owned First American through a series of agreements with front men.

In testimony before the House and Senate last fall, Clifford maintained that he and his partner were unaware of the agreements. He acknowledged traveling to London frequently to consult with Agha Hasan Abedi, BCCI’s founder, but said he believed that Abedi was only an adviser to the stockholders in First American.

Clifford has had a distinguished career as an adviser to Democratic presidents and as a powerful lawyer in Washington. He first rose to prominence in the Administration of Harry S. Truman and later served as defense secretary under former President Lyndon B. Johnson.

Always, however, the distinguished, white-haired lawyer has straddled the world of private and public service in Washington. He has represented many of the nation’s largest companies in dealings with the government.

He first represented BCCI in 1978 when the bank made an aborted attempted to acquire the predecessor to First American. Three years later, he was the lawyer for a group of BCCI shareholders who successfully won federal permission to acquire the Washington banking company.

During the final hearing on the matter before the Federal Reserve, Clifford vouched for the integrity of the shareholders and promised regulators that they were operating independently of BCCI. He also said that BCCI would have no role in the new bank, which was renamed First American.

Clifford became the chairman of the board and Altman served as the bank’s president until they were forced to resign last year after the seizure of BCCI. During their tenure at First American, they continued to represent BCCI as its lawyers.

Frantz reported from Washington and Goldman from New York. Times staff writer Ronald J. Ostrow also contributed to this story from Washington.