A former FBI supervisory special agent who held a top-secret clearance has been charged with stealing nearly $1 million in cryptocurrency from digital wallets tied to counterintelligence investigations, then seeking advice from ChatGPT on how to invest the money and relocate to Europe, according to court records unsealed this week.
Patrick Steven Yaroch, 37, of Ashburn, Virginia, was arrested July 31 and charged in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia with interstate transportation of stolen goods, securities and monies, and receipt of stolen goods, securities and monies. The FBI fired him the same day.
Prosecutors allege the transfers began in late 2024 or early 2025 while Yaroch worked on a national-security squad in the FBI’s Boston field office investigating an individual linked to an adversarial nation. He later transferred to the Counterintelligence and Espionage Division at FBI headquarters. Two sources told NBC News the nation was Russia.
According to an affidavit filed Aug. 1, Yaroch grew frustrated that the bureau could not or would not disrupt the target’s use of cryptocurrency accounts. He decided to “take matters into his own hands,” searched internal FBI systems for wallet credentials, memorized the recovery seed phrases, created his own wallets and executed about 10 to 12 transfers into accounts under his control. The holdings eventually reached roughly $1 million, the affidavit states.
Yaroch told investigators he never spent the money and never contacted anyone associated with the accounts. Agents later recovered a Trezor hardware wallet, handwritten seed phrases and accounts on platforms including Kraken and the decentralized lending protocol Suilend. Roughly $925,000 was moved into government-controlled wallets during the search of his home, according to the court filing.
The case surfaced after Yaroch contacted a Justice Department employee he knew on July 28 via Signal and asked to meet about personal matters. When they met at FBI headquarters the next day, the affidavit states, he “immediately started to break down as he told his story.” He said the shame was “eating him up inside” and that he wanted to “get it off his chest.” He also submitted an online self-report form and told agents he had “f**ked up.”
Investigators recovered ChatGPT conversations from Yaroch’s phone. On May 28 he asked how he should invest or spend $1 million “to maximize profit and return.” Less than a week later he asked: “If you had a bucket of money (around $1 million) and you wanted to leave the USA and become a resident or citizen of an EU country, what would you do?”
The chatbot’s reply, according to the affidavit, referenced details Yaroch had shared about his age, young family, wife, child, interest in a 2-to-5-hectare estate and preference for age-worthy red wine and a slower-living vineyard lifestyle. It identified Portugal as its top recommendation.
Agents also found bookings for Yaroch, his wife and their child on a Sept. 3 flight to Portugal, along with a power-of-attorney document authorizing two Portuguese lawyers to obtain a local tax identification number for him. Undisclosed trips to Germany, Portugal and Grenada between May and July violated bureau reporting rules, the affidavit states.
Yaroch had served with the FBI since 2017 and held a Top Secret clearance with access to sensitive compartmented information. An FBI spokesperson said the bureau “immediately took action” upon learning of the allegations, fired him and is conducting a thorough investigation. “We hold our employees to the highest ethical standards, and this conduct is not tolerated at the FBI.”
U.S. Magistrate Judge Lindsey R. Vaala ordered Yaroch temporarily detained. A detention hearing was scheduled for the following day. No attorney for Yaroch was listed in the initial court records.
