ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Patrick Steven Yaroch, a supervisory special agent in the FBI's counterintelligence and espionage division, faces criminal charges for allegedly stealing nearly $1 million in cryptocurrency from wallets tied to foreign adversaries under active investigation.
Yaroch extracted private crypto keys from FBI systems and used them to execute as many as a dozen unauthorized transfers into his personal accounts, according to a criminal complaint and affidavit filed in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.
On July 28, Yaroch confessed to a colleague, saying he had stolen funds from multiple adversarial cryptocurrency wallets. He told investigators he acted out of frustration with how the FBI managed those accounts and planned to use the money to retire to a vineyard, the affidavit said.
The FBI fired Yaroch following his confession. He was arrested last week and now faces charges of interstate transport of stolen goods and receipt of stolen goods.
The case puts direct pressure on law enforcement protocols for securing seized digital assets — specifically, who holds key access and whether internal controls can stop a credentialed agent from moving funds undetected.
