Former FBI supervisor Patrick Steven Yaroch pleaded guilty to wire fraud and money laundering after using cryptocurrency credentials gathered in bureau investigations to steal approximately $2,474,380.66, federal prosecutors said. The November 5 plea covers a scheme involving roughly 100 fraudulent transfers connected to 35 separate FBI investigations. The Justice Department said [4] that the stolen funds came from wallets controlled by investigation subjects, adversarial nation-state actors and at least one wallet created by the FBI for an operation.
Yaroch, 37, worked in the FBI’s Boston Division before moving to the Counterintelligence and Espionage Division in February 2025. Court documents say his access to FBI systems exposed cryptocurrency credentials collected during investigations. He used those credentials to move funds into wallets he controlled, exchanged the assets for other cryptocurrencies and routed the proceeds through additional transactions to obscure their source and ownership.
The conduct compromised multiple investigations involving criminal groups and nation-state adversaries, according to the DOJ. It also affected FBI sources and methods used in foreign-intelligence collection and criminal investigations, potentially undermining the bureau’s ability to use seized or monitored wallets as investigative assets. The case highlights the operational risk created when sensitive wallet credentials are accessible to personnel outside the immediate investigative team.
Prosecutors said Yaroch used some of the proceeds to pay credit-card balances, car payments and other loans. He also sought advice from ChatGPT about investing approximately $1 million and relocating to the European Union. After the chatbot suggested buying a vineyard in Portugal, he gave Portuguese lawyers power of attorney to help obtain a tax identification number and access to a financial portal, and made arrangements to travel there.
The FBI placed Yaroch on leave after he disclosed his conduct to a former Justice Department colleague, then terminated him two days later. Investigators seized devices and other assets, including material connected to his personal cryptocurrency accounts. Yaroch is scheduled to be sentenced on March 4, 2027, and faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison, although the final sentence will depend on the federal sentencing guidelines and other statutory factors.
The plea follows earlier cryptocurrency-theft cases involving federal agents. Former Secret Service agent Anthony Joseph Evans admitted in 2024 to transferring cryptocurrency worth about $56,000 from a hardware wallet held in an agency evidence vault into wallets he controlled, according to the DOJ [16]. In a separate Silk Road investigation, former Secret Service agent Shaun W. Bridges pleaded guilty after moving approximately 20,000 bitcoin, worth about $350,000 at the time, into a wallet he controlled and later liquidating it for approximately $820,000. Federal prosecutors documented that case [17].
References
- Former FBI agent pleads guilty to Cryptocurrency theft
- Former Secret Service Agent Pleads Guilty to Theft …
- Former Silk Road Task Force Agent Pleads Guilty to Money Laundering and Obstruction
