Crypto 'pig butchering' scam wrecks bank, sends ex-CEO to prison for 24 years
Shan Hanes, former CEO of Heartland Tri-State Bank, was sentenced to over 24 years for embezzling $47 million, leading to the bank's collapse and significant financial losses for victims.
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The former CEO of Heartland Tri-State Bank in Kansas, Shan Hanes, was sentenced to over 24 years in prison for embezzling $47 million from the bank. Hanes fell victim to a "pig butchering" scam, where scammers convinced him to invest in fake cryptocurrency opportunities, leading him to transfer bank funds to their wallets. His actions resulted in the bank's collapse and subsequent FDIC takeover, marking it as one of only five U.S. bank failures in 2023. Hanes misappropriated funds from various sources, including a local church and his daughter's college savings, to facilitate these transfers. Despite initially using personal funds for cryptocurrency investments, he resorted to stealing from the bank after being targeted by the scammers. During his sentencing, victims expressed the severe financial impact of his actions, with many losing significant portions of their retirement savings. Hanes showed little remorse during the proceedings, and his sentencing was described as a shock to him. The case highlights the dangers of investment scams and the vulnerabilities even experienced financial professionals can face.
- Shan Hanes embezzled $47 million from Heartland Tri-State Bank, leading to its collapse.
- He was sentenced to over 24 years in prison for his actions.
- Hanes was duped by a "pig butchering" scam that promised fake cryptocurrency returns.
- Victims of the embezzlement suffered significant financial losses, including retirement savings.
- The case underscores the risks associated with investment scams, even for banking professionals.
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13 commentsIt’s interesting that this one guy gets 24 years over 47 million dollars. Yet, not a single executive, board member, VP or SVP got arrested for the fraud that lead to the 2008 crash. We are talking orders of magnitude more than this and they declined to prosecute even though the evidence was absolutely abundant as we now know.
This guy doesn’t deserve any sympathy but it should be known that he’s hardly the most egregious financial criminal walking the streets. That honor goes to Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan Chase.
edit: at the very least, they should have fired all the executives from the banks, and their boards, and stripped them of their compensation packages, and clawed back anything they earned in that time period, and banning them for life from working in the financial sector in any capacity ever again. That would have been more appropriate than jail time and sent an actual message to Wall Street that this behavior won't be tolerated.
This sort of thing has existed for a long time, but this term makes it sound like something that is new or novel. Feels like the media is doing a bit of... "headline engineering", here.
Let this be yet another painful reminder to the rest of us that diversification of your retirement funds is critically important. Putting 70% of your life savings into one investment leaves you with the stark possibility of surviving off only 30% of what you spent a lifetime saving.
> “He said, ‘Brian, I’ve got this money and it’s in cryptocurrency, and I need $12 million to help verify the funds.’
What?
There is little reason to assume the CEO in fact didn't orchestrate this whole purported "scam".
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