Bank error, crime, or fraud

[scottrr]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? California

I had a separate savings account in my name only, the money was from investments I made pre-marriage. I had it there for two months waiting for my financial adviser to meet with me for a plan.

The wife found out about it, called on the phone and hacked my PIN and transferred $19,000 from my savings to joint checking and took a cashiers check for $19,000 out of the joint account and opened an account at Wells Fargo and deposited it out of my reach.

Short term marriage of less than 4 years and going to trial Jan 09 for property distribution. At the time of the "theft" we were legally married and legal separation was a month later.

Is this a crime or do I have civil remedies against the bank? The divorce attorney has pretty much kissed off any chance of getting it back.

 

[ecmst12]

And when you contacted the police to report the theft, what were you told?

 

[scottrr]

I was told that it was a civil matter as she has community interest in the money and the bank fraud dept said she could do what she did. This whole action took place in two minutes, she called form the bank parking lot (cell records record time) and went inside and withdrew money (bank transaction time stamp) and transferred it to Wells Fargo (copy of back of check) that same day.

 

[Dougthegreat]

The wife found out about it, called on the phone and hacked my PIN and transferred $19,000 from my savings to joint checking and took a cashiers check for $19,000 out of the joint account and opened an account at Wells Fargo and deposited it out of my reach.

Then I would very much like to meet your wife. The ability to actually hack someone's PIN is pretty difficult. More than likely, she socially engineered whoever was at your bank, or you had really weak security questions and she reset your PIN.

As presented, it sounds like it would be hard to prove anything against the bank, depending on how long ago this was. Questions like "What is my cat's name" make poor security questions - five minutes on someone's blog, and you can reset their passwords/PINs. However, this does not necessarily make the institution liable, as YOU chose the security question.

 

[ecmst12]

I suspect the wife did not 'hack' the pin so much as 'guess' the pin because OP had it set to a number he had used in other matters, or was in some way significant to his life.