IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 18-40036

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff - Appellee

v.

SILVIA BEATRIZ PEREZ-CEBALLOS, 

Defendant - Appellant 

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Southern District of Texas

Before JONES, BARKSDALE, and WILLETT, Circuit Judges.

EDITH H. JONES, Circuit Judge:

Following a jury trial, appellant Perez-Ceballos was exonerated of money 

laundering but convicted for bank fraud perpetrated upon a branch of 

J.P. Morgan Chase Bank under 18 U.S.C. § 1344(1). After carefully reviewing 

the record, we conclude there was insufficient evidence to sustain the 

conviction and therefore REVERSE.

BACKGROUND

Silvia Beatriz Perez-Ceballos moved to the United States in May 2013

after her husband, Jose Manuel Saiz-Pineda, lost his position as Secretary of 

Finance and Administration for the State of Tabasco, Mexico, in the 2012 

elections. She testified that she has not returned to Mexico since. Shortly after 

her arrival in Texas, in June 2013, Perez-Ceballos opened a bank account in 

United States Court of Appeals

Fifth Circuit

FILED

October 30, 2018

Lyle W. Cayce

Clerk

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her name at J.P. Morgan Chase Bank (“Chase Bank”) at its Richmond Sage 

branch in Houston. No false statements were alleged to have been made in 

connection with opening this account. Nevertheless, in 2017, Perez-Ceballos 

was convicted of defrauding Chase Bank based on her transfer of certain funds

to and through this account. 

To properly trace Perez-Ceballos’s transfers of funds, it is necessary to 

backtrack several years. In 2010, while living in Mexico, Perez-Ceballos and 

her husband opened a securities account at HSBC U.S. Bank (“HSBC”). The 

couple represented to HSBC that the source of funds for the account was their 

accumulated savings and savings/employment. Perez-Ceballos acknowledged 

to the HSBC financial advisor, Sonia Fernandez, that she was a “politically 

exposed person” (“PEP”), a designation reserved for individuals who hold office 

in a foreign government and for their families. In 2012, after Fernandez 

transferred to UBS Financial Services (“UBS”) and HSBC decided to close its 

PEP accounts, Perez-Ceballos and Saiz-Pineda contacted Fernandez and 

transferred their assets from HSBC to UBS. The PEP designation followed 

Perez-Ceballos and Saiz-Pineda when they transferred their assets to UBS 

because once someone is designated a PEP, she is always a PEP—even if she 

or her family member leaves office. 

Perez-Ceballos and Saiz-Pineda maintained their account with UBS 

until the political upheaval in Mexico. After he was ousted from office, SaizPineda was apprehended while trying to enter the United States in June 2013, 

after which he was arrested by the Mexican authorities and charged with 

illegal enrichment. Upon learning of his arrest, Fernandez notified PerezCeballos that UBS could no longer service the account and that she would need

to transfer the assets elsewhere. Fernandez advised Perez-Ceballos of her 

options: she could transfer the assets in kind, which would require “a brokerage 

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relationship in the same name,” or she could liquidate the account and “then 

send the money wherever it was that she had a relationship.” 

Around that same time, Perez-Ceballos was referred to Paul Arnold, an 

international financial advisor with Chase Investment Services Corporation 

(“Chase Investment”), to discuss potential investment strategies for the assets 

held at UBS. Arnold met exclusively with clients whose primary residence was

outside the United States, because only non-resident aliens were eligible for 

the tax-exempt investments that he oversaw. During their consultation, 

Perez-Ceballos falsely told Arnold that her primary residence was in Mexico. 

Based on this misrepresentation and after discussing her investment aims, 

Arnold recommended that she apply for a brokerage account with Sun Life 

Financial, an insurance company registered in Bermuda that operates like a 

trust. Perez-Ceballos would not have been deemed eligible for this account if 

she had honestly informed Arnold that her primary residence was in Texas. 

Notably for jurisdictional purposes, neither Arnold’s employer (Chase 

Investment) nor Sun Life Financial is FDIC-insured. 

In the course of opening her Sun Life Financial account, Perez-Ceballos 

made several additional misrepresentations to Arnold and Sun Life Financial: 

she represented that she was separated from her husband; that she was not a 

PEP; and that she signed the requisite documents in Mexico where they had 

been mailed to her (as required) when in fact she signed them in Houston after 

she sent her brother to retrieve the documents and bring them back to the 

United States. Perez-Ceballos also gave Arnold a UBS statement from August 

2013, from which she had removed Saiz-Pineda’s name as a joint account 

holder. 

In October 2013, having secured an account at Sun Life Financial, PerezCeballos liquidated her account at UBS, transferring over $1.9 million to her 

Chase Bank savings account. At Perez-Ceballos’s direction, Chase Bank wired 

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that $1.9 million to Sun Life Financial. The funds did not return to Chase 

Bank after that point. However, in May 2017, Perez-Ceballos attempted to 

withdraw funds from Sun Life Financial and again falsely affirmed that she 

lived in Mexico. Had her withdrawal been successful, the $1.9 million would 

have most likely been transferred back to Perez-Ceballos’s Chase Bank savings 

account. 

This last series of transactions—the transfer of $1.9 million from UBS to 

Chase Bank to Sun Life Financial in 2013 and the attempted transfer of 

$1.9 million from Sun Life Financial back to Chase Bank in 2017—formed the 

heart of Perez-Ceballos’s bank fraud conviction. Because the account at Sun 

Life Financial was procured by false misrepresentation, the government

contends that the October 2013 transfer through Chase Bank and the May 

2017 attempted transfer to Chase Bank exposed Chase Bank to a risk of loss.

In April 2017, Perez-Ceballos was indicted—along with Saiz-Pineda and 

another co-conspirator—on one count of conspiracy to launder monetary

instruments, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1956, and one count of conspiracy to 

commit bank fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 1344, 1349. The original 

indictment alleged that Perez-Ceballos had executed or attempted to execute 

“a scheme and artifice to defraud Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, Royal Bank 

of Canada, and J.P. Morgan Chase Bank.” The case went to trial. After the 

government rested, Perez-Ceballos moved for judgment of acquittal under Fed. 

Rule Crim. Pro. 29, based in part on the government’s failure to prove FDICinsured status for the banks listed in the indictment. The government

conceded lack of federal criminal jurisdiction as to Morgan Stanley and the 

Royal Bank of Canada, but not as to Chase Bank. The district court accepted 

this concession and denied the motion as to Chase Bank. Following another 

unsuccessful attempt by Perez-Ceballos to dismiss pursuant to Rule 29, the

jury acquitted Perez-Ceballos of money laundering but found her guilty of bank 

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fraud under 18 U.S.C. § 1344(1). The jury rejected all forfeiture contentions, 

apparently for lack of sufficient evidence to hold that the property in question 

was derived from proceeds obtained through the alleged bank fraud conspiracy. 

Perez-Ceballos was sentenced to ten months’ imprisonment. 

Perez-Ceballos appeals her conviction, contending that (1) the 

government failed to establish federal criminal jurisdiction; (2) there was 

insufficient evidence to support her conviction; and (3) prosecutorial 

misconduct occurred at several points during trial. Because this court reverses

Perez-Ceballos’s bank fraud conviction, the prosecutorial misconduct claim is 

moot; the following analysis is limited to issues of federal jurisdiction and 

evidentiary sufficiency.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

“When a defendant has timely moved for a judgment of acquittal, we 

review challenges to the sufficiency of the evidence de novo.” United States v. 

Davis, 735 F.3d 194, 198 (5th Cir. 2013). This same standard is used to review

jurisdictional challenges based on lack of FDIC-insured status in prosecutions 

under 18 U.S.C. § 1344. Id. at 198–99. Nevertheless, “review of the sufficiency 

of the evidence is highly deferential to the verdict.” United States v. MorenoGonzalez, 662 F.3d 369, 372 (5th Cir. 2011) (internal quotation marks and 

citation omitted). A conviction must be affirmed if “any rational trier of fact 

could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable 

doubt.” United States v. Vargas-Ocampo, 747 F.3d 299, 301 (5th Cir. 2014) (en 

banc) (emphasis omitted).

DISCUSSION

I. Federal Jurisdiction

To sustain a conviction for bank fraud under 18 U.S.C. § 1344, the victim 

bank must be FDIC-insured. See Davis, 735 F.3d at 198. “As this Court has 

repeatedly and consistently stated” when reviewing bank fraud convictions,

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“proof of FDIC insurance is not only an essential element” of the crime, “but it 

is also essential for the establishment of federal jurisdiction.” United States v. 

Schultz, 17 F.3d 723, 725 (5th Cir. 1994). Where the government fails to 

sufficiently prove the FDIC-insured status of the victim bank, this court has 

overturned bank fraud convictions for lack of jurisdiction. See, e.g., Davis, 

735 F.3d at 199 (collecting cases). Perez-Ceballos contends that her conviction 

should likewise be reversed because the government failed to prove beyond a 

reasonable doubt that Chase Bank, the only federally-insured institution

remaining in the case, was the victim of any fraud. Absent proof that Chase 

Bank was defrauded, Perez-Ceballos argues, there is no federal jurisdiction.

We disagree. Whether Chase Bank was the victim of bank fraud goes to 

the merits of Perez-Ceballos’s appeal, not to jurisdiction. In this circuit and 

others, courts generally wrestle with § 1344 jurisdiction when defendants are

convicted of defrauding a non-FDIC insured institution. See, e.g., Davis, 

735 F.3d at 196, 200–01 (refusing to find jurisdiction where the defendant was 

convicted of defrauding American Express Company, which lacked FDICinsured status); Schultz, 17 F.3d at 724, 726 (refusing to find jurisdiction where 

the defendant was convicted of defrauding TCB-Sugar Land, which lacked 

FDIC-insured status); United States v. Edelkind, 467 F.3d 791, 797–98 (1st 

Cir. 2006) (upholding jurisdiction where the direct victim was not FDIC 

insured after finding that Lehman Brothers, an FDIC-insured institution, was 

also victimized by the defendant’s fraud). In this case, by contrast, the FDICinsured status of Perez-Ceballos’s alleged victim, Chase Bank, is established

by the record. Both the indictment and jury instructions indicate that PerezCeballos was charged with defrauding Chase Bank, an FDIC-insured 

institution. The jury verdict confirms that Perez-Ceballos was convicted of 

defrauding Chase Bank, not Chase Investment or Sun Life Financial. Because

the alleged victim bank is FDIC insured, jurisdiction exists.

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II. Sufficiency of Evidence 

Despite establishing jurisdiction, the government failed to produce

sufficient evidence to convict Perez-Ceballos of defrauding Chase Bank. Under 

18 U.S.C. § 1344(1), a defendant is guilty of bank fraud if she “knowingly 

executes, or attempts to execute, a scheme or artifice—(1) to defraud a 

financial institution.” To sustain a conviction under this statute, the 

government must prove both intent to defraud and FDIC-insured status. See

Loughrin v. United States, 134 S. Ct. 2384, 2389–90 (2014) (“[T]he first clause 

of § 1344, as all agree, includes the requirement that a defendant intend to 

‘defraud a financial institution’; indeed, that is § 1344(1)’s whole sum and 

substance.”) (emphasis in original). “The essence of fraud is that its 

perpetrator has persuaded his victim to believe, beyond the dictates of reason 

or prudence, what is not so.” United States v. Church, 888 F.2d 20, 24 (5th Cir. 

1989). Intending “a scheme to defraud” has a broader definition that “includes

fraudulent pretenses or representations intended to deceive others, in order to 

obtain money from the victim institution.” United States v. Barakett, 

994 F.2d 1107, 1110–11 (5th Cir. 1993) (internal quotation marks and citations

omitted). Therefore, “[w]hile section 1344(1) prohibits only crimes directed at 

financial institutions, we have not held that the statute punishes only schemes 

directed solely at institutional victims. We have recognized that knowing

execution of schemes causing risk of loss—rather than actual loss—to the 

institution, can be sufficient to support conviction.” Id. at 1111 (internal 

citations omitted).

Even against this expansive backdrop, Perez-Ceballos’s bank fraud 

conviction cannot stand. First, the government failed to adduce evidence that 

Perez-Ceballos made any false statements to Chase Bank. No Chase Bank 

witness testified at trial. According to the evidence at trial, Perez-Ceballos’s

numerous false statements were all made either to Chase Investment (through 

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Arnold) or to Sun Life Financial. Neither the government’s briefing nor oral 

argument cites evidence that clearly established (or even directly alleged) that 

Perez-Ceballos fraudulently made Chase Bank believe anything. The closest 

the government came to offering such proof occurred in a brief exchange in 

which Arnold testified that Perez-Ceballos was referred to him “from the 

banking side of JPMorgan [i.e., Chase Bank],” and that he “believe[d] it was 

the branch manager” who made the referral. At oral argument, the 

government insisted that this testimony justified an inference that PerezCeballos made misrepresentations to Chase Bank. Whether any 

misrepresentations by Perez-Ceballos to Chase Bank necessarily underlay this 

referral is, however, entirely speculative, and Arnold’s minimal testimony did 

not connect the dots back to Chase Bank. Even viewing the evidence in the 

light most favorable to the verdict, these passing statements of a single witness

unconnected with Chase Bank are insufficient for any reasonable trier of fact 

to conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that Perez-Ceballos persuaded Chase 

Bank to believe what was false. See Church, 888 F.2d at 24.1

Second, the government also failed to prove that Perez-Ceballos intended 

to “obtain money from the victim institution” or otherwise exposed Chase Bank 

to “risk of loss.” See Barakett, 994 F.2d at 1111. The $1.9 million that PerezCeballos transferred to and through Chase Bank was her money, which she 

had authority to withdraw freely. Relying on the testimony of Arnold from 

Chase Investment and Fernandez from UBS, the government nevertheless 

 

1 There is some indication from the briefing that the government considers PerezCeballos’s act of ordering a $1.9 million wire transfer from Chase Bank to Sun Life Financial 

to be a misrepresentation. However, as this court held in United States v. Briggs, “The bare 

act of instructing a bank to transfer funds is not a factual representation; thus, it cannot be 

a misrepresentation, a false representation, or any kind of representation.” 939 F.2d 222, 

226 (5th Cir. 1991) (emphasis in original). Although Briggs was reviewing a conviction under 

18 U.S.C. § 1344(2), the same logic applies here.

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insists that Chase Bank became vulnerable when it became the way-station

for money transferred to a fraudulently-opened brokerage account. Under the 

government’s theory, however, Arnold’s and Fernandez’s testimony on risk of 

loss was largely predicated on the assertion that Perez-Ceballos’s funds were

proceeds from a money laundering scheme. The jury’s refusal to convict on 

money laundering removes that predicate, and the government offers no other 

evidence that Chase Bank suffered any risk of loss from the defendant’s merely 

opening the account and moving from it money within her legal control. 

Moreover, neither Arnold nor Fernandez worked for Chase Bank or 

spoke specifically to the risks that Chase Bank faced from Perez-Ceballos’s 

misrepresentations. Their testimony focused primarily on the liability their 

own employers could face from the false statements Perez-Ceballos made to 

their institutions. Arnold did testify that Chase Bank “[a]bsolutely” has “to 

follow a lot of rules set forth by the OCC, the SEC, and other governmental 

entities” and that “if the bank doesn’t follow those rules,” it could be sued, cited, 

or fined.2 Such generalized observations about banking industry regulations 

are a far cry from demonstrating that Chase Bank faced any risk of loss for 

depositing Perez-Ceballos’s own money into her savings account and then

transferring it at her request. Although risk of loss need not be “substantial” 

to support a conviction, the evidence on risk of loss does need to be sufficient. 

See United States v. McCauley, 253 F.3d 815, 820 (5th Cir. 2001) (“[T]he 

government need not prove a substantial likelihood of risk of loss to support 

 

2 Arnold was also asked on direct examination whether “if someone turns over falsified 

documents to the bank, either JP Morgan Chase or Morgan Stanley, could that potentially 

put [a] bank at risk of civil liability?” Although the question was phrased broadly, Arnold 

limited his response to his own experiences working in the investment sector, couching his 

reply almost entirely in “I” statements. In any case, because the government failed to show 

that Chase Bank received any falsified documents, this line of questioning was irrelevant for 

purposes of evidentiary sufficiency.

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the convictions.”). The evidence provided by the government here is

insufficient.

In the absence of sufficient evidence that Perez-Ceballos made false 

statements to Chase Bank or that she made false statements to another party 

while intending to obtain money from Chase Bank in a way that exposed Chase 

Bank to a risk of loss, the government failed to prove that Perez-Ceballos 

defrauded Chase Bank. Without an FDIC-insured victim, there is no basis for 

upholding Perez-Ceballos’s federal bank fraud conviction. 

CONCLUSION

For the foregoing reasons, Perez-Ceballos’s conviction is REVERSED. 

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