Spartan Trading Company, LLC, et al.

The Securities and Exchange Commission announced today that on June 30, 2023, the Honorable Jerry W. Blackwell of the United States District Court for the District of Minnesota entered an Order on the SEC's Emergency Motion for Ancillary Relief. The Order imposes an asset freeze and prohibits the destruction of records.

The SEC's complaint, filed on June 29, 2023, alleges that Spartan Trading Company, LLC (Spartan Trading), was a fraudulent pooled investment fund founded by Richard Myre, Dale Dahmen, and Dominick Dahmen in 2019 that raised over $3.7 million from investors. The complaint further alleges that Myre and the Dahmens signed up investors for Spartan Trading on the premise of pooled day trading - telling investors that Myre would manage the fund's investments and that investors would keep half of all profits. The complaint alleges that, in reality, Spartan Trading was a sham, Myre made very few actual investments, and those investments he did make often lost money. Among other things, the complaint also alleges that investor funds were slowly eaten away by the over $1.9 million that Myre and the Dahmens withdrew from Spartan Trading accounts during the life of the fund. According to the SEC's complaint, Spartan Trading began to unravel in late 2022. After a February 2023 meeting to discuss the fund's organization and activities, Myre and the Dahmens were found dead in a pickup truck in Bloomington, Minnesota in what local police reported to be a murder-suicide arising from a business dispute.

The SEC's complaint alleges that Spartan and Myre violated Section 17(a) of the Securities Act of 1933, Section 10(b) of the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934, and Rule 10b-5 thereunder. The complaint further alleges that Myre violated Sections 206(1), 206(2), and 206(4) of the Investment Advisers Act of 1940 and Rule 206(4)-8 thereunder. While not alleging that Dale or Dominick Dahmen committed direct violations of the securities laws, the complaint names the estates of both as relief defendants as a result of having obtained profits from the fraudulent scheme. The SEC's action is proceeding against Spartan Trading and the estates of the deceased.

The SEC's investigation was conducted by Lee Farsnworth and Larry Brannon and supervised by C.J. Kerstetter of the Chicago Regional Office.