## Facts

- Maurice Waller opened a checking account at Suburban Trust Company in Maryland in February 1976.
- After a teller declined to cash Waller’s tax refund check due to insufficient funds, Waller and a co-worker cashed their refund checks elsewhere and returned to the bank.
- Waller deposited $800 in cash consisting of $50 and $100 bills with sequential serial numbers; a teller-trainee reported the deposit as unusual to bank supervisors.
- The assistant manager contacted the bank’s security department; a security officer investigated and confirmed with the FBI that the serial numbers were not on any warning list.
- The security officer then contacted local law enforcement, learned of a recent robbery involving stolen currency, and provided information that led to Waller’s arrest and a robbery charge; the prosecution later dismissed the charge.
- Waller sued the bank and obtained a $50,000 jury verdict based on, among other theories, breach of an implied duty of confidentiality in the bank-customer relationship.

## Issues

1. Whether a bank owes a depositor a duty of confidentiality regarding account and transaction information.
2. If such a duty exists, whether the bank’s disclosures to law enforcement were privileged as reasonable and necessary, or actionable as a breach.
3. Whether the reasonableness of the bank’s disclosures was a fact question for the jury or should have been decided for the bank as a matter of law.

## Decision

- The appellate court affirmed the judgment for Waller.
- The court recognized that a bank owes a depositor a qualified (not absolute) duty of confidentiality concerning account and transaction information.
- The court held that the permissible scope of disclosure depends on whether it is reasonable and justified under the circumstances.
- The court concluded that reasonable minds could differ on whether the bank’s conduct—particularly continuing to involve police after the FBI reported no match to warning lists—was reasonable.
- The trial court therefore properly submitted the reasonableness question to the jury and did not err in refusing to take the case from the jury.

## Legal Principles

- The bank-customer relationship includes an implied obligation that the bank will not disclose customer account or transaction information without justification.
- The confidentiality obligation is qualified; disclosure may be permissible when:
  - required by law or legal process, or
  - made in good faith to protect legitimate bank interests, and communicated in a reasonable manner, or
  - otherwise shown to be reasonable and necessary under the circumstances.
- A bank may incur liability when it gratuitously or unreasonably provides information that wrongfully implicates a customer, including where the disclosure foreseeably leads to arrest or similar harm.
- When evidence allows competing inferences about good faith, necessity, or scope of disclosure, the reasonableness of the bank’s conduct is generally a question for the jury.

## Conclusion

The court affirmed a verdict against a bank for breach of a qualified duty of confidentiality, holding that the reasonableness of the bank’s disclosures to law enforcement—given the manner and extent of its communications—was properly left to the jury.


Suburban Trust Co. v. Waller, 44 Md. App. 335, 408 A.2d 758 (Ct. Spec. App. 1979)