A former Wells Fargo financial advisor in California faces up to two years in prison and a $250,000 fine after pleading guilty to aggravated identity theft amid charges he stole $158,000 from two bank customers.
Tyler Rigsbee, 32, of Folsom, Calif., worked at Wells Fargo in Sacramento from 2016 to 2021, according to his BrokerCheck file. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of California said that during his employment at a major bank, understood to be Wells, he stole $158,000 from the bank accounts of two customers and tried to replenish funds with assets from a third customer.
“Rigsbee stole this money by transferring it from customer accounts to brokerage accounts he created at E-Trade, a third-party financial institution,” said the Department of Justice in a press release announcing Rigsbee’s plea agreement. “He then transferred the money from these brokerage accounts to his own personal bank account. Rigsbee also attempted to conceal his scheme by partially replacing some of what he stole from one of these bank customers with money he took from the account of a third bank customer.”
When one bank customer died in August 2018, the plea agreement says, Rigsbee created and notarized a fraudulent request for distribution of eligible assets from a transfer-on-death account, using the name of the customer’s nephew, who was the listed as the beneficiary on the account at Wells Fargo. This March 2019 request directed $113,000 in assets to the E-Trade account, which was in the nephew’s name, but which Rigsbee controlled, the agreement said.
“Rigsbee then transferred the funds from this brokerage account into his own personal bank account at [Wells Fargo],” the plea agreement says.
For the second customer, who was elderly, Rigsbee created a fraudulent account at E-Trade the customer was unaware of, then falsely pretended to be that customer and used the customer’s name, the DOJ said. In this case, Rigsbee transferred $45,800 from the customer’s Wells Fargo account to the fraudulent E-Trade account, then back into his own personal bank account at Wells. Rigsbee got a third customer involved when he tried to replace funds he took from the second customer. The third customer, also elderly, also had a false E-Trade account created in their name, and after moving assets here, Rigsbee tried to replenish what had been lost from the second customer’s account.
The DOJ did not say when the money was taken from the second and third customers' accounts.
Wells Fargo fired Rigsbee in April 2021, according to BrokerCheck. According to the plea agreement, the bank made the customers whole and bore the brunt of the loss.
“Rigsbee faces a mandatory term of two years in prison and a statutory maximum fine of up to $250,000 fine or twice the gross gain or gross loss, the DOJ said, though it added that the sentence will be left to the court’s discretion.
Rigsbee was barred by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority in July 2021 when it said he refused to provided documents the agency requested related to rule violations. The agency was following up on Wells Fargo’s termination notice for Rigsbee, which discussed the illicit transfers.
A spokesperson for Thomas A. Johnson, Rigsbee’s Sacramento-based attorney, said the firm was not in a position to comment by press time.
Rigsbee is scheduled for an initial appearance on October 5 before Magistrate Judge Kendall J. Newman.