A mysterious company that bought more than 50,000 acres of land around a California air force base for $800 million is now suing farmers for conspiracy to sell it at inflated prices.
Public records show that since 2018, “Flannery Associates” has invested more than $800 million in approximately 55,000 acres of land surrounding the Travis Air Force base.
Flannery is now suing local farming families for $510 million, accusing them of “acting in blatant disregard of federal and state law” by conspiring to inflate the value of the land it sold them.
Travis Air Force Base, northeast of San Francisco, is a strategically important base that serves as a “gateway” to the Pacific Ocean. It houses large transport aircraft used for refueling smaller aircraft and shipping aid and ammunition around the world.
But Rep. John Garamendi, D-Calif. now claims the lawsuit is in fact part of a plan to bankrupt the farmers and has a “deep suspicion” that the land is being bought by a group linked to China.
Rep. John Garamendi, D-Calif. (pictured) says he’s spoken to the families who sold their land to Flannery who claim they didn’t want to sell it in the first place. He claims the lawsuit is a targeted attack designed to bankrupt local families
Public records show that since 2018, ‘Flannery Associates’ has invested more than $800 million in about 55,000 acres of land around the Travis Air Force base
Flannery claims it has ‘smoking gun’ evidence, including text messages and emails between vendors revealing they illegally colluded to sell the farmland for a bounty
In its first complaint, Flannery claims it has “smoking gun” evidence, including text messages and emails between sellers revealing they illegally colluded to sell the farmland for a “substantial fair market value premium.”
Garamendi told NewsNation he has spoken to the families who sold their land to Flannery who claim they didn’t want to sell it in the first place.
He also said there was nothing requiring Flannery to pay what he believes is more than the market value for the land.
While saying that while there was no direct evidence that Flannery has ties to China, there were “deep suspicions.”
A lawyer representing Flannery has said the group is controlled by US citizens and 97 percent of its capital comes from US investors – with the remainder coming from British and Irish citizens.
Nevertheless, after eight months of investigation, the Air Force’s Foreign Investment Risk Review Office has yet to identify a single individual as part of the group.
“In fact, the fact that they chose to buy all three sides of Travis Air Force Base immediately raises questions about national security,” Garamendi told NewsNation.
“So, is this Chinese money? We don’t know, but we do know that the Chinese money was used in North Dakota and we have a very strong suspicion, given the amount of money, given the lack of regard for values, that they just took all this country,” he added. please.
In his lawsuit, filed in California’s Eastern District Court, Flannery names a number of individuals accused of being involved in the scheme.
Among them was Thomas McCormack, a director of the Bank of Rio Vista, which was founded and run by his family, according to SFGate.
He sold his approximately 2,500 acres to Flannery on December 18, 2019 for $20,876,500, or about $8,400 per acre, according to the lawsuit.
Travis Air Force Base, northeast of San Francisco, is a strategically important base that serves as a “gateway” to the Pacific Ocean
The base houses large transport aircraft used for refueling smaller aircraft and shipping aid and ammunition around the world
“It’s a lawsuit designed to force the farmers to get a lawyer, spend tens of thousands of dollars on a lawyer, and maybe at the end of the day put themselves out of business,” Garamendi told News Nation.
“In fact, that’s what happened to at least one family I know, and I’ve heard rumors that another family simply said we can’t afford the lawyers.”
“Travis Air Force Base is absolutely necessary. It’s the gateway to the Pacific Ocean,’ Garamendi said.
“Much of the ammunition going to Ukraine also went through Travis Air Force Base.”
A letter to Solano County, most of which is owned by Flannery, describes the company as owned by a group of families seeking to diversify their portfolio from stocks to real assets, including farmland in the western United States. said the provincial newspaper the Republic of the Day.
The United States Department of Agriculture has conducted its own investigation into who is behind Flannery, but has reportedly yielded no results.
“Nobody can figure out who they are,” Ronald Kott, mayor of nearby Rio Vista, now mostly surrounded by Flannery land, told The Wall Street Journal. “Whatever they do — this looks like a long-term stretch.”
Over the years that Flannery, registered in Delaware, has bought up land, it has issued several statements and directions as to what it intends to do with it.
An attorney for Flannery, Richard Melnyk, said in an email to the county in 2019 that it was considering partnering with local farmers to grow “new types of crops or orchards,” according to The Journal.
Melnyk is mentioned by name in the “smoking gun” correspondence presented to the court, which shows landowners privately discussing Flannery’s takeovers.
“Melynk (sic) bullies the last property owners,” reads one of the messages. “I think we should meet for the next two weeks to talk about Flannery.”
Mitch Mashburn, who works for the county, questioned the feasibility of using the land for agricultural purposes.
“Most of the land they buy is dry farmland,” he told The Journal. “I don’t see where that country can make a profit to make it worth nearly a billion dollars in investment.”
In a separate email also read by the newspaper, Melnyk said Flannery is considering leasing “a significant portion” of his land to olive growers, including some at the base.
According to online company records, a person named Thomas Mather was listed as once a director or officer of the company, although there is almost no other publicly available information about him.
He is also listed as the manager of another Delaware registered company called Diversified Land LLC, with the same California address in Folsom.
In North Dakota, land has been purchased by the Chinese Fufeng Group 20 minutes, approximately 26 miles, from Grand Forks Air Force Base
The mystery surrounding Travis is reminiscent of last year’s much smaller purchase of 300 acres of farmland in North Dakota by a company with ties to China
The mystery surrounding Flannery is reminiscent of last year’s much smaller purchase of 300 acres of farmland in North Dakota, just minutes from another air force base.
China-based food producer Fufeng Group planned to build a corn plant on its new land in Grand Forks, just 20 minutes from Grand Forks Air Force Base, which houses some of the country’s most sensitive drone technology.
The purchase drew suspicion from military officers, national security experts and lawmakers alike.
A 2019 report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture found that China owned at least 192,000 acres of farmland in the U.S. worth more than $1.9 billion.
For example, while Canada owns much more U.S. farmland, a 2018 USDA report showed that China’s farmholdings in the U.S. and other provinces have increased tenfold since 2009.