SAN FRANCISCO––Wells Fargo is once again the target of a potential criminal investigation.
The latest trouble for the big bank involves federal prosecutors in New York who have opened a criminal investigation into whether Wells Fargo violated federal laws by conducting sham interviews of minority and female job an sham interviews of minority and female job candidates, according to two people with knowledge of the inquiry.
The investigation is being conducted by members of a newly created unit inside the criminal division of the Manhattan U.S. attorney’s office, the people said. They requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.
The investigation, which is in its early stages, was spurred by a May 19 report in The New York Times that centered on a whistle-blower, Joe Bruno. Bruno, a former Wells Fargo employee, and others said bank managers were interviewing job applicants whom the bank deemed “diverse” — a catchall term for racial minorities, women and members of other disadvantaged groups — for roles that had already been promised to other people, according to the Times.
‘Noble Goal That Became Twisted’
These sham interviews were the result of the bank’s quest to increase diversity — a “noble goal that became twisted in practice because, some employees said, it was more about recording the bank’s efforts to hire more minorities than actually hiring them,” the report stated.
The practice was tied to Wells Fargo’s “diverse slate” policy, which stipulated that at least half the candidates interviewed for jobs paying $100,000 or more needed to be “diverse,” the New York Times reported.
The rule was put in place in mid-2020. However, the practice of conducting fake interviews existed long before then, because Wells Fargo had a similar unwritten policy, some have alleged, the Times reported.
A Wells Fargo spokeswoman declined to comment on the investigation.
Wells Fargo’s chief executive officer, Charles W. Scharf, announced that the bank would temporarily pause its “diverse slate” rule to study its implementation and make changes to prevent more fake interviews from being conducted.