Around the State: September 19, 2022

The counties and cities within the state of North Dakota hold many interesting news stories.

Here are just a few of the feature stories that others are reading in communities around the state.

Torgerson pleads guilty to bank fraud

Brady Torgerson, 34, has entered a formal guilty plea in federal court to two charges of bank fraud. The former president of First Security Bank - West in Beulah and The Union Bank in Glen Ullin entered into a plea agreement in June.

Under terms of the agreement, prosecutors will ask for a sentence in the court-approved range of up to 3½ years in prison with restitution of $451,000 and three years of supervised release.

Torgerson, along with his father Brent Torgerson, 60, and Kelly Huffman, 32, were indicted by a federal grand jury in November.

The board said Torgerson made loans beyond the bank’s legal lending limit, at a reduced interest rate, along with 91 loans totaling $12.7 million without securing liens or getting financial information and distorting the bank’s financial position on quarterly reports in 2020.

(Story by Bill Schmaldeldt, the Hazen Star)

Ray schools face ‘dire’ bus driver situation

The bell rings at 3:20. Students stream out of classrooms, filter through the halls and crowd onto yellow school buses waiting to taxi them home.

That’s the daily scene at Ray High School - except when there’s no driver for a route.

Normally this scenario would be handled by one of the three substitute bus drivers contracted with the school district, except none of those three drivers were available either, so superintendent Kris Kuehn had no choice but to cancel one route that could not run on a Friday.

The school district is seeking to replenish its ranks of substitute bus drivers to avoid similar situations in the future and is willing to pay those drivers well when they’re called upon.

(Story by Jacob Orledge, the Tioga Tribune)

Names released from shooting

The Towner County Sheriff’s office has released the names of the four deceased individuals who were found at the 610 block of 66th Street NE on August 29. They are Doug Dulmage of Leeds (56). Justin Bracken of Leeds (34), Richard Bracken of Leeds (64) and Robert Bracken of Cando (59). The weapon recovered from the scene was a .357 caliber revolver.

No information regarding a motive for the shooting had been released.

(Story taken from the Benson County Farmers Press)

Former Rolla teacher facing felony charges

A former Rolla school teacher and coach was arrested and is facing two felony charges.

Davy Zinke was arrested on August 26 and charged with luring minors by computer and corruption of a minor.

The corruption charge is a Class C felony.

According to court records, Zinke appeared in Barnes County Court on August 29. He is innocent until proven guilty.

Zinke was a wrestling coach and physical education teacher at Mt. Pleasant School in Rolla for 23 years before leaving in 2011.

(Story taken from the Turtle Mountain Star)

Board game comes to fruition

“My family and I have played it hundreds of times and they still enjoy playing it,” said Mitch Haugeberg, who recently launched a marketing plan for a board game he created in the 1990s.

While it probably comes as no surprise that today all of Haugeberg’s children have a version of his board game, soon, the rest of society will too.

“It’s a cross between the games of Monopoly and Life,” he said.

Thanks to some iterations such as the making of a rule book, the board game will soon come to fruition on a commercial level.

How the game works, Haugeberg says, is somewhat random. Or as a game-goers like to say, based on luck.

“You roll dice or spin a spinner,” he said. “It’s like the classic/traditional style game where you go around the board.”

Two to eight players can play the game and averages about 20 minutes per player,Haugeberg said.

When it comes to the mechanics of the game, Haugeberg said there are four categories on the board. Such as wages, family, investment and lifestyle.

“There’s more perks and pitfalls with whatever lifestyle you get into,” he said.

“I have it marketed on a crowd-funding website called “kickstarter,” but the chances of success are slim when you innovate a boardgame, Haugeberg said.

“Between 3,000 to 5,000 boardgames are created a year and one-percent become profitable,” he said.

To learn more, go to strikeitrichboardgame.com, or check out the kickstarter website for the “strike it rich” board game.

(Story by Asheigh Plemper, the McKenzie County Farmer)

Cross-country tourist gasses up at Crosby

Small plane landings at Crosby’s airport are a pretty common occurrence, but one landing recently was markedly different - a kit-built aircraft, resembling an overgrown dragonfly.

The craft was piloted by “Tom: Xie, originally from the Chinese capital of Beijing. He is living and working in the southeastern U.S. and said he had been planning some kind of excursion to see the country for some time.

One option he’s considered was a trip down the Mississippi River, by boat.

“Too much paddle,” Xie laughed.

Xie’s cross-country flight originated in Fort Payne, Alabama; his destination, the Pacific Coast of Oregon.

“I want to see the beaches there,” he said.

Xie’s plane is neither big nor fast. Rather, it’s a 19-year-old CGS Hawk he purchased from an owner in Louisiana.

Classified by the manufacturer as an ultralight aircraft, Xie’s transportation is anything but fancy. The fiberglass-reinforced fabric cockpit features two seats, one behind the other, controls and communications.

Power comes from a four-cylinder engine rating at 65 horsepower.

“My destination today is 215 miles away,” he said. “The winds are picking up. I don’t want to make any mistakes.”

Using small airports like Crosby’s and the one he was headed to in Big Sandy, Montana, Xie has his entire trip plotted on his phone.

And then, back to Alabama.

(Story by Brad Nygaard, the Journal, Crosby)