Former TD Bank worker pleads guilty to fraud, bribery scheme costing $3.4M

A former TD Bank employee pleaded guilty to defrauding customers and bribing an employee at another financial institution to falsify bank records, facilitating more than $3.4 million in fraud losses, the Justice Department announced.

Cheungkin Lam, 28, also known as Kelvin Lam, of Queens, New York, entered his guilty plea on charges of conspiring to commit wire fraud affecting a financial institution and making false bank entries or reports, according to court documents. He is scheduled to be sentenced Oct. 15 and faces a maximum penalty of 30 years in prison.

Prosecutors said Lam exploited his position at TD Bank between January and May 2021 to identify accounts with large balances and steal confidential customer information, which he then passed to outside co-conspirators who used it to drain customer accounts. In a separate scheme from May through August 2022, Lam bribed an employee at another financial institution to falsify bank records and open an account that was later used in fraud schemes carried out by his co-conspirators. In total, Lam received at least $155,000 in bribes and facilitated $3,433,989.07 in fraud losses, according to court documents.

“Lam abused his position as a bank employee to help fraudsters steal money from unwitting customers and bribed another bank employee to do the same,” Assistant Attorney General A. Tysen Duva of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division said. “Bank employees are the first line of defense against money laundering, fraud, and other financial crimes. When bank employees violate the public trust by using their positions to enrich themselves through financial crime, the Criminal Division will investigate and prosecute them.”

U.S. Attorney Robert Frazer for the District of New Jersey said Lam leveraged his own insider position and that of a co-conspirator at two financial institutions to facilitate millions of dollars in fraud in exchange for bribes. “We expect bank employees to help root out fraud, not enable it,” Frazer said.

IRS Criminal Investigation and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation Office of Inspector General investigated the case, with assistance from the Morristown Police Department, the Justice Department said. Trial Attorneys D. Zachary Adams and Chelsea Rooney of the Criminal Division’s Money Laundering, Narcotics and Forfeiture Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Marko Pesce, deputy chief of the Criminal Division for the District of New Jersey, are prosecuting the case.

The press release also noted that the Money Laundering, Narcotics and Forfeiture Section’s Bank Integrity Unit investigates and prosecutes banks and other financial institutions, including employees whose actions threaten the integrity of an institution or the broader financial system.

A federal district court judge will determine Lam’s sentence after considering U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors, prosecutors said.

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