Former FBI Agent Pleads Guilty to $2.47M Crypto Theft
Former FBI agent Patrick Steven Yaroch pleaded guilty to stealing $2,474,380.66 in crypto through roughly 100 transfers tied to 35 FBI investigations. He faces up to 20 years in prison, with sentencing set for March 4, 2027.
A former FBI agent pleaded guilty on Nov. 5, 2026 to wire fraud and money laundering for using his official access to steal $2,474,380.66 in cryptocurrency tied to FBI investigations.
Patrick Steven Yaroch, 37, of Ashburn, Virginia, entered the plea in federal court in Alexandria. The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Virginia announced it in a post on X, saying he used his access to steal crypto.
U.S. District Judge Patricia Tolliver Giles accepted the plea. Yaroch faces up to 20 years in prison, and sentencing is set for March 4, 2027. The case number is 1:26-CR-208.
What the court papers say
According to the court papers, Yaroch made roughly 100 fraudulent transfers using credentials tied to 35 separate FBI investigations. The funds came from wallets controlled by investigation subjects, nation-state actors and at least one wallet the FBI created for an operation.
Prosecutors say the thefts began no later than December 2024. He swapped the stolen crypto into other assets and ran further transactions to obscure its origin.
Yaroch worked in the FBI Boston Division from 2017 to early 2025 on a squad focused on an adversarial nation-state. He moved to the Counterintelligence and Espionage Division at headquarters in February 2025.
Between Nov. 25, 2025 and Jan. 13, 2026, he moved about $93,082 into one of his accounts and used the funds to pay credit cards, car payments and loans.
The statement of facts says his conduct compromised multiple FBI investigations, along with sources and methods used in foreign intelligence collection and criminal cases. The U.S. Attorney's Office said the thefts:
"deprived FBI employees of their ability to carry out their functions to protect public safety and national security."
U.S. Attorney's Office, Eastern District of Virginia
Portugal plans
Prosecutors say Yaroch asked ChatGPT how to maximize investment returns and where to live in the EU. After it suggested a Portuguese vineyard, he gave Portuguese lawyers power of attorney on June 15, 2026, handing over his tax ID and finance portal password. He also arranged travel for September 2026.
Scale grew from the earlier charges
The plea figure is far larger than the account in the August criminal complaint, which described about 10 transfers totaling roughly $1 million. Yaroch self-reported the activity to two department employees on July 29, 2026, and the DOJ Office of the Inspector General flagged the case in August. Accounts differ on whether his arrest came in July or followed the August complaint.
Agents seized a Trezor wallet, three passports and a paper with seed phrases, according to the FBI affidavit. Kraken held about $188,600 and Suilend about $933,800. About $925,000 was moved to government wallets, while about $165,600 in USD on Kraken could not be moved the same way.
The affidavit quotes Yaroch referring to "very poor decisions," saying others "could not or would not act," and that he chose to "take matters into his own hands."
First Assistant U.S. Attorney Theophani K. Stamos and Daniel S. Wierzbicki, special agent in charge of counterintelligence at the FBI Washington Field Office, announced the plea. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Kathleen Robeson and Russell Carlberg are prosecuting.
Open questions
The Justice Department did not name the foreign countries or the affected investigations. It is unclear how many of the 35 compromised cases can be repaired.
The gap between the roughly $1 million in the earlier account and the $2.47 million plea figure remains unresolved ahead of sentencing.
Separately, the FBI is working with Binance and law enforcement on roughly $3B frozen after the Binance hack.
