Best friends square off in lawsuit over failed hemp investments

LARIMER COUNTY — Lifelong friends, described as best friends with matching tattoos, and whose families have been closely aligned for three generations, are now adversaries in a suit filed Thursday in Larimer County District Court. 

The suit alleges that Justin Loeffler, his partners from Virginia and Nebraska, and a now-defunct Greentree Ag Ventures LLC, defrauded Drew Holm of Platteville, his investment partner and their Premium Choice Consulting Corp., in a failed hemp farm operation initially in Wyoming and later in Larimer County.

The suit alleges that Loeffler and his partners used his close friendship with Holm to lure him into a hemp operation investment that resulted in the loss of $800,000. The grow operation, at the time, would have been illegal in Wyoming, and the defendants were aware of that, according to the suit.

On April 10, 2019, Loeffler formed Greentree Ag Ventures LLC, 2754 Duesenberg Road in Cheyenne, which is listed as delinquent in Colorado and dissolved in Wyoming. Together with Marcus McDonald of Virginia, Justin Hernandez of Nebraska and Josh Harm of Nebraska, Loeffler and Greentree worked to secure an investment from Holm. Holm recruited Thomas J. Thompson, a friend from New York, to join the effort, and they created Premium Choice Consulting Corp.

After transferring $500,000 and later $300,000 more to Greentree in 2019, Premium learned that the operation was not as represented and that the money had been diverted to family members or to expenses that were not as represented in the plan, the suit said. Any proceeds would first pay back investors, according to the agreement signed between Greentree and Premium, but the suit alleges that Greentree investors either failed to invest their share and/or repaid themselves first.

The suit seeks return of the $800,000, up to triple damages and attorney and court costs.

Messages left on three phone numbers for Loeffler were not returned. Loeffler also did not respond to an email sent to his email address.

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