Former TD Bank employee in AML unit charged with check fraud-related crime

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TD Bank was already in trouble due to its failures to combat money laundering. Now a former employee in the bank’s AML department faces a felony charge in connection with a separate alleged criminal scheme.

Daria Sewell, 32, pleaded not guilty Thursday in New York state court to a felony charge of possessing customers’ personal information.

Although the former TD employee was arrested in September, the case was not made public until the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office issued a press release on Thursday.

The accusation against Sewell points to another challenge related to TD’s anti-money laundering problems. The U.S. unit of Toronto-based TD Bank Group recently pleaded guilty in federal court to a money laundering conspiracy.

Sewell allegedly engaged in a different type of misconduct than what the federal investigation uncovered. The state case stems from an investigation focused on check fraud, authorities said Thursday.

Sewell, who worked at TD from 2023 to May 2024, allegedly used his position in the bank’s AML department to steal from TD customers.

After prosecutors executed a search warrant on his cell phone, prosecutors found images of 255 checks with customers’ names on them, according to the prosecutor’s office. The cellphone also contained personal information, including the names, addresses and Social Security numbers of about 70 customers, prosecutors said.

Sewell allegedly distributed customer information in a channel he operated on Telegram, an encrypted instant messaging platform, instructing others to open bank accounts to deposit the checks and then split the profits.

“Telegram can be a hotbed of criminal activity, and we have uncovered everything from fraud to illegal firearms sales to terrorism financing,” Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said in the press release.

Sewell faces a single charge of second-degree unlawful possession of personally identifiable information. He is currently out on his own recognizance and is next scheduled to appear in court Dec. 19, according to a spokesperson for the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.

The case against Sewell stemmed from a larger investigation in which five other people were charged in a nearly $500,000 check fraud scheme, according to the Manhattan prosecutor’s office. The DA’s office said those five defendants and others contacted Sewell to discuss their strategies for committing check fraud.

Authorities did not name the other five defendants, and a spokesman for the prosecutor’s office did not say whether any or all of them were current or former TD Bank employees.

The investigation into the check fraud scheme is ongoing, according to local prosecutors, who thanked New York Police Department detectives for their work on the case.

Sewell’s attorney, Lawrence Fisher, did not respond to a request for comment Friday.

A TD Bank spokesman said Sewell was terminated and the bank is fully cooperating with investigators. A bank spokesman would not comment on whether other TD employees had been fired in connection with the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office’s check fraud investigation.

Sewell’s not guilty plea came the same day TD Bank was fined He is in New Jersey federal court on charges related to money laundering.

Last month, the Canadian bank’s US arm Pleaded guilty to money laundering conspiracy After allowing hundreds of millions of dollars of dirty funds to flow through its channels.

The sentence handed down Thursday by U.S. District Judge Esther Salas was in line with what federal prosecutors recommended. The bank must pay a $1.4 billion fine, forfeit $452 million in criminal property and hire an independent monitor for three years. He will also be sentenced to probation for 5 years.

The Ministry of Justice prosecuted two non-executive employees of TD in connection with the money laundering investigation, but no senior executives faced charges. Attorney General Merrick Garland said in October that criminal investigations into individual employees at all levels of the bank were ongoing.