All of the conduct described herein occurred within the County of St. Louis, State of Minnesota, unless otherwise noted. June 5, 2025, Officer Holty investigated a report of theft involving rent monies collected at the Pioneer Apartments, 321 W 1st Street. Officer Holty spoke to the owner of the apartment complex TJ Bjella, and learned that and estimated $25,000 worth of rent payments were due to him May 31, 2025, and he never received the payment. Bjella explained that he hired a property manager named Christina Differding who was responsible for collecting rent from the tenants of the apartment complex.
Differding confirmed to Officer Holty that she collected the rent checks and cash from tenants, and that she was in the process of consolidating the payments into a single account, and that she had planned to provide the funds to Bjella soon. By July 5, 2025, Bjella still had not received the May 31, 2025 rent payments but he received only $650 of $27,500 owed. August 19, 2025, Investigator Temple interviewed Mason Jesse Andrew Russell, [DOB REDACTED], who is Differding’s son. Russell told Inv. Temple that he stole the checks and cash from his mother’s purse, which she had tried to hide from him at their home at 15 E 11th Street, Duluth.
Russell told Inv. Temple that he took the cash and used it to gamble at Fond du Luth Casino, and that he kept thinking that he would win big at the casino, but that he lost all the money. He tried to cash the checks, he said, at online banking service locations but was not always able to obtain the value from the checks. When he could not get money for the checks he would throw the checks away, he told Inv. Temple. Bjella provided Inv. Temple with a spreadsheet of missing rent funds. The total amount calculated was $19,993. Differding said she did not think it was that much, but that she was new to the business of collecting rent checks and money, as she had just started that job May 1, 2025. The figure of $19,993 was the total amount that Bjella recorded as collected from tenants but that was not remitted to him, the property owner, for the rent payments in May and June, 2025. Russell told Officer Lutzka in a conversation initiated by Russell 7/1/2025, that he had Autism, ADHD, anxiety and depression, and on 7/1 he wanted police to transport him to the hospital to talk with a doctor about his mental health issues.
Russell was not interviewed about the suspected theft 7/1, but was taken instead to the emergency department for treatment. PLEASE TAKE NOTICE: Pursuant to Minn. Stat. 609.49, intentional failure to appear for duly scheduled court appearances may result in additional criminal charges, and in addition to any arrest warrant that may otherwise be issued by the Court.
