Authorities arrested two men Thursday evening who allegedly tried to coerce a local business owner into giving them $20,000 cash.

According to a Freeborn County Sheriff’s Office news release, the two men, whose names have not yet been released, were arrested for theft/swindle, coercion and terroristic threats after an investigation involving the Freeborn County Sheriff’s Office, the Albert Lea Police Department and the South Central Drug Investigation Unit.

The release states the two men, ages 38 and 39, first approached the business owner a couple weeks ago, inquiring about him selling his business to them.

Last week, the 39-year-old man came to the store alone. He reportedly met with the store owner and showed him how to duplicate money through a chemical paper process.

He pulled out a 45-caliber handgun and a list of the owner’s family members and their addresses, and said if he called the police, he would kill him and his family.

The owner and the men met in Minneapolis later in the week, and the men demanded the owner get $20,000 for them and that they would again show him how to make the cash in exchange for the $20,000, according to the release.

On Wednesday, the two men came to Albert Lea and met with the owner and told the owner to get the cash, the release stated. The owner left for a short period of time and returned to the two men at another business.

The 39-year-old man got in the vehicle with the owner and directed him to a hotel where all of the chemicals and equipment was already set up to start washing bills.

Officers stopped the vehicle on the way to the hotel. Officers found chemicals in the trunk of the car believed to have been used to make bills, the release continued.

The other man was stopped at a local hotel and arrested there.

When detectives executed a search warrant on the hotel room, they found a suitcase containing three stacks of black paper the same size as paper bills, two containers of chemicals, a powder substance, rubber gloves, a mask, duck tape, plastic bags, rubber bands and tin foil, of which were believed to be used to attempt to make fake money.