OCC announces enforcement actions

The OCC has released a list of enforcement actions recently taken against national banks, federal savings associations, and individuals currently and formerly affiliated with national banks and federal savings associations.

• A civil money penalty of $50,000 was imposed on Michael S. Fontaine, former chief operational risk officer of U.S. Bank, N.A., Cincinatti, Ohio. This penalty is in addition to the previously reported $450,000 penalty imposed by FinCEN. The Comptroller found that Fontaine failed to take action to address inadequate staffing in the bank's BSA/AML program, allowing them to remain deficient for at least five years; and allowing the bank to implement alert suppression techniques to maintain suspicious activity alert volumes at a level commensurate with those inadequate staffing levels.
• A formal agreement with Mutual Savings Bank, Hartsville South Carolina, to address concerns relating to board and management oversight, credit oversight and administration, internal controls, internal audit, and liquidity risk management.
• Removal/prohibition orders were issued to:
  • a former teller at Bank of America, N.A., Charlotte, North Carolina (misappropriation of funds for her own use);
  • a former employee of Bank of America, N. A., Charlotte, North Carolina (misappropriation of at least $29,500 from bank customers for his own use);
  • a former service manager of Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. Sioux Falls, South Dakota (misappropriation of approximately $9,000 from her teller drawer); and
  • a former regional banking private banker at Wells Fargo Bank, N.A., Sioux Falls, South Dakota, who opened an account on behalf of a customer without authorization or knowledge of the customer and designated himself as sole owner and signer for the account. He collected funds as charitable contributions, deposited the funds into the account, and made repeated unauthorized transfers to his personal account.