WASHINGTON — The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency fined the former general counsel of Wells Fargo $3.5 million in a settlement, the agency announced Friday.
James Strother, who served as general counsel to Wells Fargo from 2003 to 2017, will pay $3.5 million to the U.S. Treasury for his role in the bank’s infamous phony-accounts scandal dating to 2016.
The OCC hit Strother and other
Wells Fargo came under sharp scrutiny for sales misconduct first reported by the Los Angeles Times in 2013. Regulators said bank employees were pressured to meet sales goals and opened millions of bank and credit card accounts without customers’ knowledge.
According to the civil charges filed by the OCC last year, Wells Fargo’s legal department led by Strother “had a responsibility to ensure incentive compensation plans were designed and operated in accordance with bank policy, evaluate risk and ensure it was adequately managed.” The department had failed to “adequately [perform] their responsibilities with respect to the sales practices misconduct problem,” the OCC complaint said.
While not banned from banking altogether, Strother will be required to present a copy of the OCC’s order to the president or CEO of any bank he is affiliated with currently or in the future, according to an OCC legal filing.
Strother also agreed “to cooperate with the OCC in any investigation, litigation, or administrative proceeding related to sales practices misconduct at the bank,” the agency said in a press release.
