US BANK REGULATOR FINES THREE FORMER WELLS FARGO EXECUTIVES OVER FAKE ACCOUNTS SCANDAL

By Pete Schroeder

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -A U.S. banking regulator said on Tuesday it had fined three former executives at Wells Fargo for their roles in the bank's long-running fake accounts scandal.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency said Claudia Russ Anderson, the bank's former community bank group risk officer, would be fined $10 million and prohibited from working in the banking industry. David Julian, the bank's former chief auditor and Paul McLinko, its former executive audit director, were fined $7 million and $1.5 million, respectively.

The trio had been previously charged by the OCC in 2020, alongside other former senior leadership of the bank, but had opted not to settle. The regulator had previously fined eight other former bank executives, including former CEO John Stumpf, a total of $43.2 million.

A lawyer for McLinko said the executive served "honorably and diligently" as an auditor for decades.

"We have said from the beginning of this case that he will be vindicated once an independent court takes the time to look at the entire record. Now ... this case will finally be heard from judges who don't work for the agency," McLinko's lawyer Timothy Crudo said in a statement.

Julian, meanwhile, said in a statement that he looks forward to appealing the Comptroller's decision.

"I executed my role as Chief Auditor in accordance with the professional standards outlined by the Institute of Internal Auditors, which are the standards the OCC requires auditors to adhere to. The evidence I presented fully supports this," he said in the statement provided by his lawyer.

A lawyer for Russ Anderson did not respond to requests for comment. A Wells Fargo spokesperson declined to comment.

In a statement, the OCC said Russ Anderson failed to credibly challenge the bank's incentive compensation program, which regulators found encouraged employees to create bank accounts for customers without their knowledge. The OCC said she "repeatedly and consistently downplayed" the misconduct, and also failed to provide information to regulators when examining the bank.

The OCC said Julian and McLinko failed to effectively audit the bank in a way that would have detected the misconduct, and failed to escalate the issues.

(Reporting by Pete Schroeder and Chris Prentice; Editing by Chris Reese, Rod Nickel, Diane Craft and Nick Zieminski)

2025-01-15T20:40:43Z