InfoBytes Blog
FinCEN, OCC take action against bank for AML violations
On December 16, FinCEN announced an $8 million civil money penalty against a Texas-based bank for violating the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) and its implementing regulations from at least 2015 to 2019 by allegedly failing to implement and maintain an effective, reasonably designed anti-money laundering (AML) program. According to the consent order, the bank allegedly failed to report hundreds of suspicious transactions to FinCEN involving illegal financial activity by its customers and continued to knowingly process the transactions after becoming aware that certain customers were subjects of criminal investigations. According to FinCEN, the bank’s violations “caused millions of dollars in suspicious transactions to go unreported to FinCEN in a timely and accurate manner, including transactions connected to tax evasion, illegal gambling, money laundering, and other financial crimes.”
The same day, the OCC announced a $1 million civil money penalty against the bank for “related violations.” According to the OCC’s separate but coordinated investigation with FinCEN, the bank allegedly failed to adopt and implement a BSA/AML system of internal controls to assure ongoing compliance with the BSA and its implementing regulations. According to the consent order, the bank’s alleged internal control deficiencies, and other failures in its BSA/AML compliance program, “resulted in the failure to investigate and disposition alerts and violations of the suspicious activity reporting requirements.” FinCEN's announcement noted that, “[a]s many of the facts and circumstances underlying the OCC’s civil penalty also form the basis of FinCEN’s Consent Order, FinCEN agreed to credit the $1 million civil penalty imposed by the OCC, and “[t]aken together, [the bank] will pay a total of $8 million to the U.S. Treasury as a penalty for its violations, with $7 million representing FinCEN’s penalty and $1 million representing the OCC’s penalty.”