The Securities and Exchange Commission says a Mississippi man raised about $4.94 million from roughly 20 investors for a medical marijuana grower and spent about $1.94 million of it on personal expenses, including jewelry and travel. In a civil complaint filed September 30 in federal court in Mississippi, the SEC alleges that Thomas J. Moore III, 59, of D’Iberville, took the money between December 2021 and August 2024 while promising profit payments that never arrived. The company carries the name Mississippi Green Oil, but the SEC describes it as a cannabis business, not an oil business. Nothing has been proven in court, and the case is at its first stage.
A cannabis grower with an oil name
According to the complaint, Moore founded the company in December 2020 and served as a member and its general manager, making the business decisions and handling the fundraising. The SEC says the company, based in Prentiss, Mississippi, planned to grow medical marijuana and sell the plants to dispensaries in Mississippi and other states. Investors received equity through “Letter of Agreement” contracts, and a typical deal gave a 1 percent stake for $300,000. The SEC says investors wired their money into bank accounts that Moore controlled.
The SEC says Moore pitched the opportunity as exclusive and went to people he knew personally, including friends and family across the country, in person and by phone, email and text. He handed out slide decks that projected first-year revenue of $40 million to $64 million, and one deck said the company would “distribute high quality flower in sufficient quantities to fuel market growth, tax revenues and profits.” He also promised quarterly profit payments starting between 30 days and nine months after an investment, for as long as the company stayed operating and profitable. The SEC says no investor was ever paid a distribution.
The complaint describes a pitch with several features that tend to appear together: an exclusive offer made personally to friends and family, glossy revenue projections for a business still waiting on its license, investor money wired to an account run by the person selling, and a promise of regular payments. Anyone handed a pitch like that faces the concrete question this case raises. What proof exists that the business is separate from the person raising the money, and what has been paid out so far?
Securities cases move through court in stages, and RetireShield’s free newsletter sends the next update on investor-fraud cases and other money news.
Get the next update free → Free from RetireShield. Unsubscribe anytime.
Where the $1.94 million went
The complaint sorts the personal spending into categories. Cash withdrawals were the largest, at about $698,000. The SEC lists about $189,000 on travel and lodging, about $180,000 at grocery and department stores, about $180,000 in transfers to family members, about $145,000 at fast-food outlets and restaurants, about $100,500 on clothing and jewelry, and about $20,500 in private school tuition. The SEC’s litigation release singles out jewelry and travel as examples of expenses it says had nothing to do with the business.
The SEC ties the spending closely to the dates new money arrived. In May 2022, after $100,000 in investor deposits, Moore allegedly spent more than $21,000 within a week on restaurants, hotels, vacation packages and entertainment. In June 2022, after $1.2 million in deposits went into one account, the SEC says about $438,000 was misappropriated, including about $241,000 in cash withdrawals and more than $38,000 in transfers to family. After $200,000 came in during March 2023, the complaint says more than $59,000 went out that month on cash, travel, jewelry, restaurants and entertainment.
Promises, delays and lawsuits left unmentioned
Text messages quoted in the complaint show how the payment promises held up. On January 13, 2024, an investor who had put in hundreds of thousands of dollars in March 2023 asked Moore about the situation. Moore replied, “we have everything paying quarterly starting first quarter march 31 June October December,” according to the SEC. On January 22 the investor wrote, “Why have u abandoned me[?]” and Moore answered that the word should not be used, adding, “You will be fine.” The SEC says no payments followed. It also says Moore promised two late-2023 investors that their $200,000 would be repaid by December 2023.
The business itself was slow to start, the SEC says. Moore applied for a cultivation license in July 2022 and received it in June 2023, so investor money had been coming in since December 2021 for a company that could not yet legally grow a crop. The first plants went in during October 2023, and the crop was substandard and sold at a deep discount. A second crop was planted in February 2024. In an April 8, 2024 letter to investors, Moore acknowledged delays and that the first product “was not up to MGO standards,” the complaint says. By October 2024 he had given up his majority interests and stopped managing the company.
The SEC also alleges that Moore kept lawsuits from prospective investors. A suit filed in federal court in Louisiana in January 2023 was followed, the SEC says, by at least 12 additional investors. After a second suit was filed in federal court in Georgia in May 2024, two more investors came in. When one asked on June 2, 2024 whether he had been served with a lawsuit, the complaint says Moore texted back “not served nothing.” The complaint lists two later suits, one in Georgia in November 2024 and one in Mississippi in June 2025.
The SEC charges six counts under Section 17(a) of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 10(b) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 with Rule 10b-5, which cover fraud in selling securities. It asks the court for a permanent injunction, a ban on taking part in offering or selling any security other than for his own account, disgorgement of gains with prejudgment interest, and a civil penalty. The case is number 1:26-cv-00286 in the Southern District of Mississippi, and the SEC has demanded a jury trial. Its Miami Regional Office handled the investigation, and Michael Mikulic is the lead litigator. The release lists no related criminal case.
Checking a private offering before wiring money
The SEC’s full complaint is public and free to read on SEC.gov, and it doubles as a list of what could have been checked at the time. The company’s license is one item. The SEC says investor money began arriving in December 2021, the license application went in during July 2022, and the license came in June 2023, so a request for proof of the license would have drawn a different answer in 2021 than in 2023. Court records are another, because the first lawsuit the SEC cites was in federal court in January 2023, before at least 12 of the investors came in.
The payment schedule is a third. The SEC says Moore promised first distributions within 30 days to nine months, and none were ever paid. The SEC says the replies to investors who asked about the missing payments were assurances and new payment dates, not payments.
What a judge decides is still open. The SEC is asking for at least the roughly $1.94 million it says was spent on personal expenses, plus interest and a penalty, and Moore’s response is not in the release. The SEC has also not said whether any of the money can be returned to the roughly 20 investors.
More Financial Reading
- How many CDs can you park at 1 bank? FDIC rules you must know
- Adding someone to your bank account: tax traps and smart moves
- Bank statements: how long to keep them and when to toss them
This article was produced with AI assistance and reviewed by The Money Overview’s editorial team.
