Ex-Signature Bank Exec Raised Fraud Allegation in Lawsuit

Months before Signature Bank was seized by regulators, a former executive claimed that employees at the bank kept their jobs despite being accused of a $1 million wire fraud scheme, while she was fired for a lesser offense.

The allegations were made in an ongoing suit filed in December by Nicole Rospond, a former senior vice president and group director at Signature, who claims she was wrongfully terminated from her job late last year. Rospond alleges that the bank committed gender discrimination under New York City Human Rights Laws by specifically protecting male employees.

Rospond claims that two colleagues, Cliff Broder and Alex Chervony, were accused of the fraudulent scheme but remained with the company, while another, Brian Hallinan, kept his job despite Signature paying out a six-figure settlement after he was accused of discrimination.

Signature Bank denied most of the allegations in a court filing. A lawyer for the bank said Rospond was terminated because Signature Bank lost faith in her judgment after she violated the company’s wire transfer policies.

But Rospond’s claims may take on new significance after a spokesperson for the New York State Department of Financial Services said this week that regulators seized the bank not because of its exposure to crashing cryptocurrency markets, but due to a “significant crisis of confidence in the bank’s leadership.”

On Tuesday, Bloomberg reported that prior to Signature’s collapse, the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission were investigating whether the bank took proper steps to detect possible money laundering.

Rospond’s lawsuit claims she was fired over a much less-serious offense than the fraud allegations made against her co-workers. She alleges that on Aug. 12, she received a request for a wire transfer from a long-time client. She said the request did not raise any red flags and she began to process it, but could not complete the request because the client did not answer the phone when she called multiple times to verify it.

Rospond claims that a male colleague then completed the transfer without the client’s recorded approval because he was in “a rush to leave early that day.” Rospond found out the following morning the client never requested the transfer because it was a fraudulent request. She says she took steps to recall the wire so the client and the bank would not lose money and later received confirmation that the funds would be returned. Weeks later, she was fired.

“Rospond was treated less well than the male employee who had improperly processed the fraudulent wire transfer, and less well than male employees who had committed far more egregious acts yet were not terminated,” the complaint alleges.

Rospond seeks a $5 million judgment against Signature, which declined to comment on the allegations through a spokesperson. Broder, Chervony and Hallinan did not immediately return requests for comment.