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It took less than five minutes in the early morning hours of April 13, 2023, for two burglary suspects to break into the Howard Lake American Legion, use a sledgehammer to blast a safe free from its mount and walk away with nearly $12,000 in charitable pull tab money.  

For Howard Lake Police Chief David Thompson, the theft felt personal. As a member of the American Legion board, he knows pull tab gambling money helps fund a long list of valuable youth activities and community needs, including girls and boys softball and baseball teams, 4-H, track, speech team, band, a junior high public safety camp with the Minnesota State Patrol, and hoses for a new fire department truck.

“The money gives kids in the community, regardless of their economic situation, the ability to play baseball and softball every year,” said Thompson. “People play pull tabs knowing that their money supports the community. People joke about it when they blow 40 bucks. They'll be like, well, at least it's going to a good cause, right? And then someone came and stole that good-cause money.”

This wasn’t a random, isolated burglary in a small town. The break-in was part of a much larger criminal operation. The organized criminal activity primarily targeted pull tab charitable gambling funds in bars and restaurants across the Twin Cities Metro Area and greater Minnesota.  

How large an operation? Eight people are now facing racketeering charges for stealing more than $197,000. The charges filed April 18 in Hennepin County District Court cover 44 felony second-degree and attempted second-degree burglaries and thefts.  

When there’s theft of charitable gambling funds, our Alcohol and Gambling Enforcement (AGE) division becomes involved. Among its activities, the division’s special agents conduct criminal investigations involving legalized charitable gambling such as pull tabs, bingo and raffles.  

AGE Special Agent Michael Miller says it’s common practice for law enforcement agencies to share information. Investigators will issue crime alerts to different regions of the state, depending on the crime. In a case like the pull tab burglaries, the alerts get the attention of AGE agents and help with their investigation.  

AGE also networks with crime analysts from law enforcement agencies who are very good at compiling information.  Miller said that was so important in this case because Bloomington had quite a few of these burglaries. Their analyst provided a significant amount of investigative assistance.

“Over time, we realized, ‘Wow, if these things are related, there’s a lot of money that’s being taken, and there’s a lot of instances occurring,’” said Miller. “It’s so frustrating and disheartening for these organizations. This is their town, and it’s their kids, veterans and residents who suffer from such brazen, criminal activity.”

AGE began coordinating the 14-month investigation in August 2023. It was painstaking work: Miller reviewed the case files from more than 20 law enforcement agencies across multiple jurisdictions. That included all their photos, videos, reports and every piece of evidence. He also executed more than 20 different search warrants for data from sources such as suspects’ vehicles, electronics and records of their activity from the phone company, Facebook and Google.  

“I was looking for any connections that I could find,” said Miller. “I really was able to help piece everything together and show that there was this pattern of criminal activity going on.”  

The investigation discovered that Arron Scott King Sr., 50, of St. Paul, led the co-defendants and others in the racketeering scheme based out of his home. King communicated the burglary targets to his accomplices. The suspects would then case or obtain information on the target businesses. They used tools such as pry bars and sledgehammers to break into buildings and access pull tab booths and safes.

The stolen funds were for charitable activities ranging from American Legion organizations in Howard Lake and Stillwater to the Rogers Youth Hockey Association and Champlin-Dayton Athletic Association.  

Miller said that collaborating with law enforcement and crime analysts made all the difference.  

“If it wasn't for that, this thing wouldn't have happened for sure,” he said.  

Thompson was grateful that AGE coordinated the investigation and successfully presented the case to the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office.  

“To have someone put that together at a state level is what needs to be done,” Thompson said. “I don't know that a local law enforcement agency could do that. I know we don't have the manpower to do that.”

Thompson said the charges were a pleasant surprise.  

Agent Miller has a final word of advice to charitable gambling managers:  Make sure security system cameras work and record clear video, and alarm systems are monitored by an alarm company.  

“Those are a huge help in both preventing these incidents from happening and giving us investigative leads if something bad does happen,” he said. 

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