Crime & Safety

Elmhurst Resident Pleads Guilty to Stealing Files From Chicago Federal Reserve Bank

Brian McCarthy faces a year in prison and $100,000 fine.

An Elmhurst resident pleaded guilty Wednesday to stealing confidential computer files on his last day of employment at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, according to a press release from the U.S. Attorney's Office in Chicago.

Brian McCarthy, 31, faces federal misdemeanor charges for stealing the bank files, which contain information relating to the bank’s responsibility to assess and monitor its credit risk exposure.

McCarthy, a former supervisor at the Federal Reserve, admitted attempting to download about 300 computer files belonging to the bank onto his personal thumb drive. He actually was able to download 71 of those files, according to the U.S. Attorney's statement.   

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McCarthy was a senior credit analyst in the bank’s Statistical and Financial Reporting Department from 2009 to 2010, and in 2011 was a supervisor in the Statistical Support Group, where he supervised about seven bank employees. He pleaded guilty to theft of property at his arraignment last week.

According to his guilty plea, McCarthy was entrusted with sensitive information. He had signed a code of conduct agreement requiring him to leave behind all bank computer files when his employment ended. The theft occurred on Oct. 5, 2011, which was McCarthy’s last day on the job. He admitted taking steps to avoid detection and circumvent the bank’s information security systems, which nonetheless determined that information had been accessed. That triggered the Federal Reserve to contact the FBI.      

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Read the plea agreement here.

The plea agreement calls for McCarthy to pay $26,400 in restitution to the bank for employee time expended to determine how much and the nature of the information he downloaded.

Under the terms of his plea agreement, McCarthy is barred from participating directly or indirectly in the affairs of any financial institution insured by the National Credit Union Share Insurance Fund or the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. without prior written consent.  McCarthy faces a maximum sentence of one year in prison and a $100,000 fine. His plea agreement anticipates a federal sentencing guideline range of 10 to 12 months in prison.  

U.S. Magistrate Judge Susan Cox set sentencing for Oct. 10.


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