Superfan ‘ChiefsAholic’ to be sentenced in bank robberies on day of Chiefs season opener

Xaviar Michael Babudar, the disgraced Kansas City Chiefs superfan known as “ChiefsAholic,” is scheduled to be sentenced Thursday in federal court in a string of bank robberies.

The sentencing comes on the same day the Kansas City Chiefs kick off their season with their home opener against the Baltimore Ravens at Arrowhead Stadium.

As part of a plea agreement, the 30-year-old Babudar pleaded guilty in February in U.S. District Court in Kansas City to three charges in connection with a string of robberies or attempted robberies of nearly a dozen banks and credit unions across seven states in 2022 and 2023.

The charges include one count of money laundering, one count of transporting stolen property across state lines and one count of bank robbery, according to court documents.

The plea involved two federal cases, a single-count indictment out of the Northern District of Oklahoma and a 19-count indictment in the U.S. District Court of Western District of Missouri. As part of a plea agreement, Babudar consented to have the disposition of the Oklahoma case take place in federal court in Kansas City.

Babudar’s attorney, Matthew T. Merryman, is asking that his client be sentenced to 10 years in federal prison. Prosecutors, however, are asking for a sentence of 20 years.

Prosecutors are also asking that Babudar be ordered to pay $532,455 in restitution and forfeit an autographed painting of Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes recovered by the FBI, as agreed to under a plea agreement.

Babudar allegedly traveled to various locations and committed a string of robberies at banks and credit unions. In days surrounding some of the robberies, Babudar attended some Chiefs away games. He then returned home to the Kansas City area and allegedly laundered the stolen money through area casinos and deposited the proceeds into his bank accounts, according to court documents.

Escape from troubled childhood

As a child, Babudar was an avid Chiefs fan. The football team and their games gave him an escape from his troubled childhood, Merryman wrote in the sentencing memorandum.

When Babudar was 8 years old, his father abandoned his family, leading to over 20 years of chronic homelessness, financial hardships and family trauma for Babudar, his mother and brother, Merryman wrote.

“It was during this transition to homelessness that Xaviar began to see himself as the support system for his family and he viewed himself as the one who would provide for his family regardless of the sacrifice,” according to the court document.

Beginning in 2013, the “shy and introverted you man” created the persona which would evolve into the ChiefsAholic — a wolf-masked football fanatic — and over the years used that persona to express himself, according to the court document.

His presence at Chiefs game grew from a couple games a year to attending every game from 2018 through 2021. He was often spotted by camera crews at games. According to the court document, his popularity on social media grew at the same time.

Babudar began to get involved in sports betting and made frequent trips to riverboat casinos, where he developed a gambling habit, Merryman said in the court document. Babudar chronicled his gambling success on social media and he amassed winnings and bought his mother and brother a house.

“Eventually, Xaviar’s luck ran out and the addiction of gambling became uncontrollable,” Merryman wrote. Babudar’s debts quickly outstripped his winnings.

Too broke to provide for his family and too embarrassed to face his fans, Babudar traded his superfan uniform for ski-goggles, work gloves and an air pistol, which became his trademarks for a string of Midwestern bank robberies, Merryman wrote.

The money he stole would find its way into Kansas City area casinos.

A 10-year sentence “is both justified and more than sufficient to satisfy the goals of sentencing,” Merryman said. Also, because of Babudar’s “quasi-celebrity status,” he is in position to potentially repay losses and provide restitution for those affected by the robberies, he said.

‘Bullet in your head’

“Despite his many public disguises, Xaviar Michael Babudar’s true nature has been revealed following his robberies and attempted robberies, of eleven banks and credit unions across eight states stealing $847,725 during a sixteen month period,” prosecutors wrote in their sentencing memorandum.

In all but a few of the robberies, Babudar brandished what appeared to be a firearm, according to the document. While some of the money he stole was recovered, most was not.

“Babudar’s robbery spree enabled him to purchase expensive tickets to Kansas City Chiefs games and cultivate a large online following as ‘ChiefsAholic,’ a knockoff of the Chiefs’ official mascot K.C. Wolf,” prosecutors said.

In the midst of his crime spree, Babudar touted his work ethic and cast himself as role model on social media.

“After graduating KSU in 2016 I was working a warehouse job making $12 an hour . . . Today I manage multiple warehouses throughout the Midwest region and make an excellent living, and I’m only 28 years old,” Babudar posted in a since-deleted tweet on X, formerly Twitter. “Hard work pays off and don’t let ANYONE tell you otherwise.”

The sentencing memorandum contains a timeline of several of Babudar’s robberies and attempted robberies, including photos of him in his disguise and climbing over teller’s counters. The document described surveillance video in one of the robberies showed that Babudar had his finger on the trigger of a gun while he pointed it at an employee’s arms.

The document also contains statements of victims who were working at the time of the robberies.

Babudar allegedly threatened his victims, including telling one, “If you don’t open it, I will blow your brains out.” He also allegedly told employees in one robbery that if they gave him a dye pack, he would return and “put a bullet in your head.”

“You did not just steal money,” an unidentified credit union employee wrote in a victim’s statement. “You took more than paper and ink — you stole my safety, my job, my world that day. I feared for my life because you wanted to have fun.”

The victim continued: “I remember the gun you jabbed in my side, the nasty words as you rushed me to the vault. I watched as you hurt my coworkers and scared us to death.”

One victim described how Babudar had robbed many of the same employees at a location twice, months apart. The second time, the bank had a different name.

“It was heartbreaking to see my teller’s reactions as they saw him coming and couldn’t do a thing to stop him . . . he took them straight to the vault and held a gun to each of their chests . . . ,” the unidentified victim wrote. “My female teller had the imprint of that gun on her chest for over an hour and had bruising for several days afterward.”

Another victim described how at one of the robberies, more than money was stolen.

“The credit union had been a warm and welcoming place where many of the same people came every week,” the victim wrote. “We knew them; we knew about what was happening in their lives. It was like a large social support network, not just a credit union . . .. All those relationships are now gone.”

Lengthy sentence justified

In his plea agreement, Babudar admitted to robberies or attempted robberies in Clive, Iowa; Bixby, Oklahoma; Omaha, Nebraska; West Des Moines, Iowa; Nashville, Tennessee; Savage, Minnesota; Apple Valley, Minnesota; Papillion, Nebraska; Sparks, Nevada, and Eldorado Hills, California.

The sentencing memorandum noted that Babudar was originally arrested shortly after the robbery in Oklahoma in December 2022. He was released on bond in February 2023. Days later the Chiefs won the Super Bowl and Babudar won $100,000 on two bets he placed in June 2022 in the midst of his robbery spree.

Days after receiving his winnings, Babudar removed his ankle monitor and fled. Over the next few months, he robbed two more banks before he was arrested in California on July 7, 2023, four days after his most recent robbery, the memorandum said.

Prosecutors contend that Babudar’s multi-state robbery spree warrants a lengthy sentence, noting that even after he was caught, he escaped state custody and “quickly resumed robbing banks.” They contend that virtually all of his robberies entailed some form of violence, whether it was physical assault of an employee, the brandishing of what appeared to be a gun, or both.

He then compounded those crimes by laundering the proceeds through Kansas City casinos, they said.

“The wolf and ski masks he wore were attempts to hide his true nature from the word, because underneath each of them Xaviar Babudar is a man who violently robbed, or attempted to rob, upwards of a dozen banks,” prosecutors said in their memorandum. “That violent bank robber is who is being sentenced, and his extensive, violent crimes justify a lengthy term of imprisonment.”