Cold Spring veteran recovers stolen fish house.
Mike Lutgen recovered his ice-fishing house Thursday after a Facebook post went viral.
January 22, 2015
Rural Rockville resident Mike Lutgen stands Thursday by the spot on Grand Lake where his ice fishing house was set up until earlier this week when someone stole it. Lutgen, a Vietnam veteran and frequent ice angler, said he had been fishing in the house about four hours before it disappeared.
COLD SPRING - Mike Lutgen wanted two things this week. First, he wanted his fish house back. And then he wanted to know why anybody would steal it.
"I just want my house back," the Vietnam veteran said Thursday morning. "And then these characters can get lost in the woods.
"These people are not fishermen. If you fish, you wouldn't do that to your neighbor. Why? Why would you?"
Lutgen might not get an answer to his question. But perhaps thanks to a social media post about the theft that went viral Wednesday night, the fish house is back with its rightful owner.
Lutgen said he spends almost every night in the fish house, often with his son, relaxing and trying to catch crappies under the ice on Grand Lake. He was there until 10:30 Tuesday night before heading back up a steep, snowy hill to his house. The next morning at 7 a.m. his son looked out his window overlooking the lake and didn't see Lutgen's fish house. Some fresh tire tracks and footprints, Lutgen said, showed two people had driven onto the lake and taken it.
Lutgen's nephew, Sean Lutgen, runs the Facebook account for his family's construction and remodeling business in Waite Park. Sean posted a message describing the fish house, alerting friends it had been stolen and asking them to spread the word. By Thursday afternoon, the post had been shared more than 3,000 times by Facebook users across the Midwest.
Late Thursday morning, a close friend of Mike's was driving on a back road near Pleasant Lake, about 6 miles from where the house was stolen, when he saw the black fishing house tucked away in a small bay on the lake.
"Whoever took it must have seen all the Facebook posts about it and realized they were going to get seen with it," Sean said. "(Mike) was super happy to have it back. He's got some irreplaceable possessions in there."
Stearns County Sheriff's Sgt. Kellan Hemmesch would not comment on whether authorities had any suspects in the theft. But he said he believed the Facebook post led to the recovery of the house.
"Social media helps us," he said. "It's more sets of eyes and ears out there. Maybe whoever stole this had it at their home, and when they saw it posted on Facebook, they knew they had to get rid of it."
Lutgen spent weeks adding special features to the fish house after buying a shell. Sean Lutgen said the house was his uncle's "pride and joy." But before it was found Thursday morning, he said he was not upset at the loss of the material item. He was confused why someone would take his fish house specifically, when it was surrounded by much more high-end versions on the lake. He was bothered by the idea that someone had spent a day fishing near him, eyeing his fish house and thinking of stealing it. And most importantly, he said, "it just isn't right."
"It's the idea of it," he said. "What went down was not right. The stuff you do in life is important."
When he found the house, Lutgen said he felt "unexplainable relief." And he planned to get right back out on the lake.
"What can I do to make it more secure? Nothing," he said. "But I put it right back in its spot, and I'll probably be out there tomorrow night."
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