Ex-Aide Testifies About Keating’s Instructions : Trial: Patricia Johnson says she was told to talk with anxious investors in the months before Lincoln S&L;’s collapse.

A former aide to Charles H. Keating Jr. said Wednesday that the thrift executive instructed her to talk with anxious bondholders in the months before Lincoln Savings & Loan’s collapse, mainly because she knew little about the bonds.

Patricia Johnson, testifying in the criminal securities fraud case against Keating in Los Angeles Superior Court, said Keating told her it was “to our benefit” that she knew few details about the sale of the risky bonds by Lincoln’s parent company, American Continental Corp.

Johnson, American Continental’s public relations director, also testified that Keating instructed her to issue a press release on Feb. 9, 1989, announcing that a final sale of the Irvine-based thrift was “imminent.” She said she was unaware then of a letter regulators had sent to Keating saying approval of the sale would be “highly unlikely.”

During cross-examination, however, Johnson said she did not remember telling a special prosecutor in a tape-recorded conversation last year that “nobody actually asked” her to handle the growing number of phone calls from small investors. The callers were American Continental bondholders concerned by news reports about Lincoln’s problems.

Johnson also testified that she was told not to tell bondholders that their investments were safe.

After the company issued its press release about the sale of Lincoln, Johnson testified, Keating had a heated discussion with company lawyers about whether a retraction was necessary. Although Keating argued that he had better information indicating the sale was going smoothly, she said, the retraction was issued anyway. The sale was not approved.

Prosecutors hope to use Johnson’s testimony to show that Keating was actively involved in misleading bondholders until bond sales ceased in February, 1989. They also hope to show that he failed to disclose the shaky financial conditions of the thrift and its Phoenix-based parent.

Keating’s lawyers contend that most of Johnson’s testimony was irrelevant because no investor interested in buying American Continental bonds relied on information she provided in phone calls or press releases.

Keating is charged with 20 counts of defrauding 22 small investors in the bond sales program. He contends that he relied on the best legal and accounting help to structure the program and that employees selling the bonds were properly trained.

The small investors identified in the year-old indictment are among thousands who lost more than $250 million after American Continental went bankrupt in April, 1989. Regulators seized Lincoln a day after the bankruptcy filing, and sold the S&L;’s operations earlier this year.