By Lori Ehde
Unless or until bar owner Dan Kern pays back the money he stole, the Hardwick American Legion is stuck with a $7,000 deficit in its gaming fund.
Kern, owner of the Green Lantern Bar, Hardwick, faces theft charges for skimming funds from the pulltab box, operated by the Hardwick American Legion.
The Gambling Control Board licenses the Hardwick Legion for pull tabs in both the Green Lantern and Kenneth bars.
As a result of the theft, not only is the Legion liable for those losses, it may lose its pulltab privileges in the Green Lantern for six months.
"It's too bad," said Legion gambling bookkeeper Diane Strassburg. "That's money that would be donated to local charities."
Kern said Tuesday that he's making payments to the Legion and intends to repay his debt in full, but meanwhile, the Legion has had to take out a loan to cover the loss. "We don't have that kind of budget," Strassburg said.
The Gambling Compliance Review Board met Tuesday, April 16, to discuss the case, which remains under investigation.
"They saw no wrongdoing on the part of the American Legion," Strassburg said, adding that no fines were levied against the organization.
She said the Legion was out of compliance in that its members knew about KernÕs problem and had been patient, hoping he'd be prompt in paying his debt.
"It's a local business, and all, but you've gotta follow the rules," she said. "It's hard, but you can't be Mr. Nice Guy all the time."
Thirty-seven-year-old Kern, also known as "Cue Ball," was charged with two counts of theft after a winter investigation revealed a $7,000 shortage in the pull tab fund at the Green Lantern Bar.
According to the complaint filed March 14 in Rock County District Court, local law enforcement executed a search warrant of the Green Lantern with the Alcohol and Gambling Enforcement Division of the Minnesota Department of Public Safety.
The agents and local officers found on Dec. 3, 2001, gambling and bar proceeds co-mingled.
When questioned, Kern said the games had been played, but instead of depositing money into the Hardwick American Legion gambling account, he had used the money to repay personal debt.
He acknowledged involvement in personal gambling and said he used proceeds from pull tab games to pay down personal debt resulting from gambling.
He said this had been going on for a year or more, and he estimated he owed the Legion around $3,800. But an audit by the Gambling Control Board identified $7,189 of gambling proceeds he had illegally retained.
His felony theft charges carry a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and/or a $20,000 fine.
Kern also owns the Green Lantern Restaurant, but his sister, Carrie Van Dyke, manages that part of the business, and neither she nor the restaurant was implicated in the pulltab theft.