The U.S. Justice Department has dropped a probe of American International Group Inc. executives involving the credit default swaps that sent the insurer to the brink of bankruptcy and forced a huge taxpayer bailout, lawyers for the executives said on Saturday.

The investigation had centered on AIG Financial Products, which nearly brought down the giant insurer after writing tens of billions of dollars on insurance-like contracts on complex securities backed by mortgages that turned out to be toxic, Reuters reported.

The U.S. government stepped in with a $182 billion bailout to avert a bankruptcy filing by AIG.

The criminal probe had focused on whether Joseph Cassano, who ran the financial products unit, and Andrew Forster, his deputy, knowingly misled investors about the company's accounting losses on its credit default swaps portfolio.

"Although a 2-year, intense investigation is tough for anyone, the results are wholly appropriate in light of our client's factual innocence," F. Joseph Warin and Jim Walden, Cassano's lawyers, said in a statement.

Forster's lawyers also confirmed the probe had been dropped.

The Department of Justice declined to comment.

AIG said in a statement it welcomed the decision.