Back in 2013 there was a local family owned grocery store whose bank account containing $35,000 was seized because they were making constant deposits just less than $10K in a bank across the street from the store.
The reason they were doing it was to minimize their cash on hand in case they were robbed in order to keep their insurance rates down.
It was all perfectly legal but the Feds didn't think so.......
The owners fought it for about 10 months before the case was finally dismissed....
Actually, it's not legal. Making repeated cash deposits/withdrawals just under the $10K limit is called "structuring" and is prohibited under the Bank Secrecy Act.
There are a lot of problems with that law, but it is the law nevertheless.
The bank dropped the ball on that one.
It’s up to them to find out if there’s a reasonable explanation of why they were doing that and not report it to the feds right away.
I know someone who has done anti-money laundering at a well known bank and that is SUPPOSED to be their procedure.
As I noted in another post, the generate suspicion because it was a pattern of avoiding the limit. Had they just deposited the money it would have triggered a review that would have been dismissed in a minute. But actively trying to avoid attention will bring a ton of attention down on you.
“...they were making constant deposits just less than $10K in a bank across the street from the store.”
Is that in a "loser pays" state, or were they slammed with legal fees?