{"id":10704,"date":"2025-04-28T21:43:51","date_gmt":"2025-04-28T21:43:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.denverpost.com\/?p=7114075"},"modified":"2025-04-28T21:43:51","modified_gmt":"2025-04-28T21:43:51","slug":"judge-orders-buyer-of-south-broadway-pot-shop-to-pay-2-2m","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/judge-orders-buyer-of-south-broadway-pot-shop-to-pay-2-2m\/","title":{"rendered":"Judge orders buyer of South Broadway pot shop to pay $2.2M"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"wp_fb_like_button\" style=\"margin:5px 0 5px 5px;float:right;height:100px;\"><script src=\"http:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/all.js#xfbml=1\"><\/script><fb:like href=\"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/judge-orders-buyer-of-south-broadway-pot-shop-to-pay-2-2m\/\" send=\"true\" layout=\"standard\" width=\"450\" show_faces=\"false\" font=\"arial\" action=\"like\" colorscheme=\"light\"><\/fb:like><\/div><div class=\"media_block\"><\/div>\n<div><img src=\"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/judge-orders-buyer-of-south-broadway-pot-shop-to-pay-2-2m.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" \/><\/div>\n<p>The buyer of a dispensary along South Broadway\u2019s cannabis-centric Green Mile stretch has been ordered to pay $2.2 million to the seller, whom it keeps accusing of fraud.<\/p>\n<p>A Cut Above, at 1911 S. Broadway, was sold for $8 million in 2022. The buyer, Colorado Holdings, has been in a dispute with the seller, Hobby Farms, for years since.<\/p>\n<p>The purchase of A Cut Above and its grow operation in Colorado Springs included a $5.8 million payment and a promissory note for the other $2.2 million, to be paid off in two years. But Colorado Holdings never paid off the note, prompting Hobby Farms to sue for payment.<\/p>\n<p>When the case went to arbitration last year, Colorado Holdings owner Jordan Lipton revealed why his company had not paid: because he believed it had been defrauded. Before the sale, Hobby Farms co-owner Phil Gist had included figures from a second cultivation site in profit-and-loss statements and failed to mention that A Cut Above\u2019s revenue was dropping, Lipton said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe finished at $14,347,000 for the year,\u201d Gist texted Lipton in early 2022, a revenue number that included the grow that was not to be part of the sale, according to Lipton.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat\u2019s great, thanks for sharing Phil,\u201d Lipton responded. \u201c\u2026 Impressive numbers.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>A few months later, Gist texted, \u201cTell your board guy that said Colorado is dead that we crushed it today,\u201d according to a copy of their text exchange that BusinessDen obtained.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGood man that\u2019s awesome. How much you boys do?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>$108,740.60,\u201d Gist responded on April 20. Lipton gushed: \u201cThat\u2019s unreal, super impressive.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But that number, sent four months before their sale closed, included the second cultivation site and was an outlier, Lipton told the arbitrator. In reality, Gist was reducing inventory levels ahead of the sale and hiding A Cut Above\u2019s falling sales numbers, Lipton alleged.<\/p>\n<p>By early 2024, Lipton had not made payments on the promissory note and was texting Gist to arrange a meeting. The latter was annoyed at the request and payment delays.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOff the record or whatever it\u2019s called. Man to man etc. What\u2019s the motive Jordan? I don\u2019t understand what you would like achieved via phone conference,\u201d Gist wrote.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBetween you and I, if the goal is to get any sort reduced agreed upon amount, that will not happen,\u201d he added. \u201cI would rather get zero then (sic) take a offer less than owed.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In January of this year, Judge Elizabeth Starrs sided with Gist. The arbitrator found that Lipton knew what he was buying and, after conducting extensive due diligence, knew what revenue the Broadway store and one cultivation site in Colorado Springs generated.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"related right\"> <\/aside>\n<p>Lipton \u201cdid not prove by a preponderance of the evidence that (Hobby Farms) violated any contractual provision or committed fraud in any way,\u201d Starrs determined Jan. 16. She ordered Colorado Holdings to hand over $2.2 million, plus interest and attorney fees.<\/p>\n<p>But Lipton had not given up. Last week, he asked Denver District Judge Andrew Luxen to throw out Starrs\u2019 arbitration award, \u201cthe product of pervasive bias\u201d against his company. Lipton says that \u201cin nearly 20 years of legal practice,\u201d his lawyer \u201chas never encountered such a blatant disregard for the rule of law\u201d as when Starrs dismissed his claim of fraud.<\/p>\n<p>Colorado Holdings\u2019 lawyer is Jeremy Wysocki of O\u2019Neil Wysocki in Frisco, Texas. Hobby Farms has been represented by Justin Bailey of the Sanders Law Firm in Colorado Springs.<\/p>\n<p>Both attorneys declined BusinessDen\u2019s requests for an interview or comment on the case.<\/p>\n<p><em><a href=\"https:\/\/myaccount.denverpost.com\/dp\/preference\">Get more business news by signing up for our Economy Now newsletter.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"media_block\"><\/div>\n<p>The buyer of a dispensary along South Broadway\u2019s cannabis-centric Green Mile stretch has been ordered to pay $2.2 million to the seller, whom it keeps accusing of fraud. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5062,10725,52,6811,6897,7938,7177,77,5577,9,5019,6845,1,3,6923,61,1736],"tags":[5063,10726,2632,6816,6898,7939,7180,2655,5580,5022,6846,6924],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10704"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10704"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10704\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10704"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10704"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10704"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}