Mars Casino Operator Sought By Creditors Saucier Has Vanished Since Bankrupt Casino Closed In November

Where is Rob Saucier?

The man most identified with the now-bankrupt Mars Casino downtown has dropped out of sight, and a bunch of people want to ask him where the money went.

“Do you know where he is? I’d love to have his address,” said Jake Miller, assistant U.S. trustee, who appointed the attorney handling the Mars bankruptcy.

On Tuesday, Saucier was supposed to meet with people who are owed money by the Spokane Mars Limited Partnership, the parent company of the Mars Casino. He never showed up.

The group of attorneys and a half-dozen or so former Mars Casino employees were told Saucier is in Nevada looking for work, according to Dan O’Rourke, an attorney representing the SMLP.

The partnership is a corporation with a number of owners, but Saucier has been identified by the U.S. Trustee’s Office as the person who’s supposed to answer questions about the company’s $3.2 million in debts.

“Mr. O’Rourke made it very clear Mr. Saucier had no intention to show up,” said Mike Piccolo, a city attorney. The city is owed $111,000 in gambling taxes under the bankruptcy.

The former employees at the meeting were trying to find out whether they would get their last paycheck or W2 forms. There’s no money for paychecks and there’s no records for W2 forms, Piccolo said.

One of the employees said the night before the casino closed, one of two ATM machines was filled with $4,000 in cash from the Mars.

But bankruptcy trustee Jack Reeves doesn’t remember seeing those machines when he inspected the building the day after it was closed by a court order last November.

At the time, Reeves found only $25.50 in change in the casino’s cash room and more change locked into the card tables.

“How can a business close that day and only have $25 in cash as their final financial statement?” Piccolo said. “If Mr. Saucier had been there, he could answer that question and maybe he had a good answer.”

Miller said he doesn’t know where Saucier is and believes the former casino operator may not know he’s under a legal obligation to show up and answer questions from creditors.

“I don’t want to be too hard on the guy until we know that he’s willfully thumbing his nose at us,” Miller said.

But if all else fails, U.S. marshals could be used to arrest Saucier and bring him back to Spokane, Miller said.

At the corner of Browne and Sprague, the Mars Casino occupied the basement of the five-story Arlington Hotel. It was one of the first casinos in the state to take advantage of a 1997 law that allowed casinos to play against gamblers and keep the winnings in card games like blackjack.

Saucier was instrumental in getting the law passed. It was the culmination of a series of gambling reforms he worked on since the mid-1990s.

The Mars hoped house-banking would save it. In November 1997, the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in an attempt to reorganize roughly $3.2 million in debts. In March it opened the full-fledged casino.

But Saucier and the Mars labored under the hammers of the Liquor Control Board, the Washington State Gambling Commission and the Spokane Police Department, all of which were displeased with the way the casino and its bar were operating.

The company also dragged its feet in paying its quarterly gambling tax to the city of Spokane. The city started pushing for the company to be liquidated. Last November, it got its wish from U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Patricia Williams.

On Nov. 24, the Mars closed its doors and Saucier couldn’t be found by any of the attorneys who wanted to talk to him.

This sidebar appeared with the story: MISSING The city is owed $111,000 in gambling taxes under the Mars Casino bankruptcy. Former employees at the meeting were trying to find out whether they would get their last paycheck or W2 forms. There’s no money for paychecks and there’s no records for W2 forms, said city attorney Mike Piccolo.