KC Chiefs Fan Sentenced to 17.5 Years in Prison for Credit Union-Bank Robberies

A federal judge sentenced the infamous Kansas City ChiefsAholic Superfan, Xaviar Michael Babudar, to nearly 17.5 years in prison on Thursday for robbing and attempting to rob eleven credit unions and banks across eight states, stealing almost $850,000 to support his nomadic-sports gambling lifestyle that captured national headlines.

U.S. District Judge Howard F. Sach in Kansas City, Mo., also ordered the 30-year-old Babudar to pay $594,555 in restitution after handing down a federal prison sentence of 210 months for concealment/money laundering and 87 months for interstate transportation of stolen property. These were two felony charges Babudar agreed to plead guilty to in February. The prison sentences are to run concurrently.

Babudar laundered much of the stolen money through area casinos and online gambling. After stealing $70,000 from the Clive, Iowa branch of Great Western Bank on March 2, 2022, when his crime spree began, Babudar carried those stolen funds to Missouri and deposited the money in two separate transactions into his personal savings accounts at a Missouri branch of the $5.3 billion CommunityAmerica Credit Union based in Lenexa, Kan., in an attempt to conceal the criminal nature of the proceeds.

For dozens of credit union and bank employees who submitted victim impact statements, Babudar stole so much more from them than just money. Some of their statements were included within the prosecutor’s sentencing memo to Judge Sach,

“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,” a former branch employee of the $420 million TENCU in Nashville, Tenn., wrote in a statement as Victim 2. “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. I lost a lot that day. You made me fearful, you cost me my job, and I have to rewrite my future because of your greedy, selfish ways. What you took cannot be replaced, but you won’t rob me of my strength.”

During the Nov. 17, 2022, TENCU branch robbery, Babudar stole more than $125,000.

Just three days after this robbery, Babudar was in Los Angeles watching the Chiefs and Chargers football game.

A month later, on Dec. 16, Babudar robbed the $2.5 billion Tulsa Teacher Credit Union in Bixby, Okla.

“Mr. Babudar jumped our teller counter, took a young mother hostage, holding her at gunpoint, forced her into the back room where he then jammed the gun into my ribs and walked me to the vault,” TTCU Victim 3 wrote. “I have been in the banking industry for almost 40 years. This was not my first robbery. However it was by far the most violent act I have ever experienced in my life. He jammed that gun into my side so hard I thought he was going to break one of my ribs. He was very loud, repeatedly threatening to shoot me in the head.”

Babudar took the money from the vault, put it in a large bag, and fled on a bicycle. Bixby police officers chased and captured him after he rode his bike into a cul-de-sac.

The TTCU robbery helped FBI investigators determine that Babudar was a suspect in other credit union and bank robberies. After finding goggles and gloves he wore during the TTCU heist, federal investigators noticed the goggles and gloves were similar to other unsolved robberies.

Unknown to investigators at that time, Babudar, who lived at various locations around the Kansas City metropolitan area, had a popular social media presence as Kansas City Chiefs superfan Twitter, now X, user @ChiefsAholic, attending most games dressed as a wolf in Chiefs clothing.

During the playoff game on Dec. 18, 2022, Kansas City Chiefs fans became concerned that their ChiefsAholic was mysteriously absent and hadn’t posted any new messages on social media. But social media sleuths reportedly found out he was in jail, which captured national news headlines.

After he was charged in Oklahoma’s Tulsa County for robbing TTCU and waiting for his court case to be heard, Babudar was released on bond in February, four days before Super Bowl LVII, which the Kansas City Chiefs won over the Philadelphia Eagles.

Months earlier, Babudar had placed two winning bets at the Argosy Casino in Alton, Ill. On June 10, 2022, Babudar bet $5,000 that Kansas City Chiefs’ quarterback Patrick Mahomes II would win the Most Valuable Player at Super Bowl LVII, which would pay out $45,000 should that occur. He also bet $5,000 that the Kansas City Chiefs would win Super Bowl LVII, which would pay out $55,000 should that occur. When the Kansas City Chiefs won the Super Bowl on Feb. 12, 2023, and Mahomes won the Most Valuable Player award, Babudar won $100,000. Argosy Casino mailed him a $100,000 check in early March 2023.

By late March, Babudar cut off his ankle monitor and fled from Oklahoma and prosecution.

“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,” federal prosecutors wrote in their sentencing memo. “While Babudar was able to speak to tens of thousands of his followers through social media during his multi-state robbery spree, the almost two dozen bank and credit union employees who he terrorized in 2022 and 2023 never had such a public forum.”

Babudar is a hopeless recidivist, according to prosecutors, having been convicted or arrested on a nearly annual basis since he was seventeen years old, for various crimes such as theft, stealing, shoplifting, burglary, false checks, and trespassing.

Even after he was arrested for the TTCU robbery, he went right back to doing it again.

While he was on the lam after he was released on bond for the TTCU robbery, Babudar stole $1,100 from Heritage Bank in Sparks, Nev. on June 8, and stole $950 from U.S. Bank in El Dorado Hills, Calif., on July 3.

Police caught up with him on July 10 when he was arrested.

Babudar’s defense attorneys sought a prison sentence of 120 months.

“Xaviar has taken full and complete responsibility for his actions in these matters before this Court and his community. Xaviar prays for an opportunity to amend his past indiscretions and be provided a chance to atone for his actions,” defense attorneys wrote in their sentencing memo to Judge Sachs. “Xaviar has processed his childhood trauma stemming from his homelessness and poverty and accepted his gambling addiction. Xaviar has identified the triggers which led to his serial misfortunes, and he is prepared to implement a full-time strategy to be successful with his family, employment, church, community and society once he is released from incarceration. Lengthy incarceration of Xaviar will not provide just punishment for an individual fully committed to rehabilitating himself.”

READ MORE: Prosecutor’s Sentencing Memo and Babudar’s Sentencing Memo