West Palm Beach FL – A federal bankruptcy judge has frozen $4,459,338.70 in proceeds from the sale of a South Dakota cattle ranch after a Toronto-based investment firm accused Adam Hendry of concealing its claim to the money throughout his personal Chapter 11 case — the second time, according to court filings, that the same creditor says it was left off a Hendry-linked bankruptcy entirely.
The order, entered September 25 by Judge Mindy A. Mora, bars Hendry’s bankruptcy Plan Administrator, Daniel Stermer, from touching the money until the underlying fight is resolved (Doc. 28, Adv. Proc. No. 26-01285-MAM).
It’s a preliminary step — the injunction only freezes the funds, it doesn’t decide who’s ultimately entitled to them — but it’s the first ruling in a case that, if the allegations hold up, would mean Hendry signed a written promise to one creditor and then, weeks later, asked a bankruptcy court to give the same money to someone else.
A Promise Made Three Weeks Before Filing
The creditor is FC Sioux Falls Pref, LP, a Delaware limited partnership that made a $3.5 million preferred-equity investment in TMG 2, LLC — a Hendry-owned entity — back in April 2022, with Hendry personally guaranteeing the debt.
By 2025, that investment had gone into default.
On April 7, 2025 — three weeks before Hendry filed his personal Chapter 11 petition — Hendry, FC Sioux Falls, and Cheyenne River Ranch LLC’s sole member, the Shalom on the Range Trust (represented by Rapid City attorney Quentin L. Riggins as trustee), signed two agreements.
In a Forbearance Agreement, FC Sioux Falls agreed to hold off collecting on the defaulted debt and to consent to Hendry’s planned bankruptcy filings.
In exchange, according to the complaint FC Sioux Falls later filed, Hendry made a specific personal commitment: to “take all action reasonably required” to help FC Sioux Falls argue that money owed under a separate, unrelated judgment — held by Alejandro Arguelles and Gatoralex Consulting, LLC, entities that trace their South Dakota footprint through Tzadik’s lobbying registration — should rank behind FC Sioux Falls’ own claim (Forbearance Agreement § 4(f)).
A companion Payment Agreement, signed the same day, spelled out how FC Sioux Falls would actually get paid: once Cheyenne River Ranch’s land sold, the proceeds — after paying off the existing mortgage — would “first be paid” to FC Sioux Falls.
The Complaint’s Central Allegation
FC Sioux Falls says Hendry never told anyone about either agreement.
According to the complaint FC Sioux Falls filed August 20, Hendry did not list FC Sioux Falls as a creditor in his bankruptcy schedules, did not include it on the creditor matrix, and did not serve it with notice of the case, the claims deadline, any of the five reorganization plans he filed between December 2025 and March 2026, the confirmation hearing, or the order confirming his plan.
That plan — confirmed May 21, 2026 — instead directed Cheyenne River Ranch’s sale proceeds to Arguelles and Gatoralex, the same creditor FC Sioux Falls says Hendry had privately promised to help subordinate.
The ranch sold for $23 million on July 29, 2026, to Heim Ranch, LLC.
After BankWest’s mortgage was paid off in full — $16,652,146.96 — $4,459,338.70 remained, and landed in the trust account of Stermer’s law firm.
According to the complaint, FC Sioux Falls didn’t learn any of this had happened until Lucas Grassano — who the complaint says “purports to be” Tzadik Management’s chief financial officer — told a company representative on July 27 that the ranch was about to close.
FC Sioux Falls also says this wasn’t the first time it went unnoticed. In a separate, earlier Tzadik corporate bankruptcy case, in which FC Sioux Falls held preferred equity, the complaint alleges the firm wasn’t told the case existed until seven months after it was filed.
What’s Actually Been Decided — and What Hasn’t
It’s worth being precise about what Friday’s order does and doesn’t establish.
The injunction freezes the $4.46 million pending trial; it is not a ruling that Hendry concealed anything, and Hendry has not personally responded to any of it.
Court records show he, Cheyenne River Ranch LLC, and Riggins (as trustee) were all personally served August 25 with an answer deadline of September 21.
Stermer, sued only in his capacity as Plan Administrator, did answer on time. His response is almost entirely noncommittal — he says he’s “without knowledge” of most of the underlying allegations and specifically states he’s “without knowledge of ‘Hendry’s concealment,’” neither confirming nor disputing it (Doc. 25).
Arguelles and Gatoralex, through attorney Daniel Gonzalez, are contesting the money on different grounds.
In a filing opposing the injunction, Gonzalez argues the “will first be paid” language FC Sioux Falls relies on sits only in a non-binding recital, not in the Payment Agreement’s operative terms — and goes further, alleging FC Sioux Falls “admitted it was never a creditor of Cheyenne River Ranch and never did any business” with it, calling the whole arrangement the product of “a conspiracy between the Debtor and Sioux Pref” to jump ahead of Arguelles’ own $10,645,377.97 judgment against Hendry (Doc. 23).
Gonzalez also argues FC Sioux Falls had actual knowledge of Hendry’s bankruptcy as early as October 2025 and simply chose not to act on it for six months.
The court sided with FC Sioux Falls on the injunction itself; the broader question of who’s actually entitled to the money — the piece Gonzalez’s arguments go to — is still unresolved.
FC Sioux Falls’ own complaint, notably, hedges on how far it needs the court to go: in a footnote, it acknowledges that if the judge reads one provision of Hendry’s plan a certain way — as paying LLC-level creditors like FC Sioux Falls before money ever reaches Hendry’s personal creditors — the firm “may not need” the broader relief it’s asking for at all.
The One Count That’s About Him, Not the Money
Most of the complaint is a fight over who gets paid, and in what order.
But Count 5 is different: it asks the court to rule that Hendry’s debt to FC Sioux Falls is excepted from bankruptcy discharge entirely, under 11 U.S.C. § 523(a)(3)(A), on the theory that he never listed the debt or the creditor despite knowing exactly who they were.
That’s not a claim about priority among competing creditors — it’s a claim that could mean this specific debt follows Hendry out of bankruptcy no matter what happens to everything else.
It’s also the one place in the case he hasn’t shown up to contest.
Absent in the Courtroom, Too
This reporter monitored the September 23 hearing on FC Sioux Falls’ request to freeze the funds and observed that Hendry did not appear in any form — not in person, not by phone, not by video.
Christina Alletto was logged into the Zoom call, but with camera and microphone off; she did not speak, and made no appearance on the record.
Riggins, by contrast, did appear — on the record, as trustee — despite the dispute over whether he’s still the trust’s trustee at all.
This disparity runs through the whole case:
Stermer answered on time.
Arguelles and Gatoralex filed a 17-page opposition to the injunction and separately sought, and got, more time to respond to the complaint.
Riggins showed up to a hearing he says he was surprised to even be noticed for.
Everyone else in this case, on some level, is engaging with it. Hendry is not.
What’s Next
Arguelles and Gatoralex now have until October 2 to formally respond to the complaint, after winning an extension.
A scheduling conference in the case is set for November 18.
In Hendry’s main bankruptcy case, a related order on the Plan Administrator’s original distribution request remains under advisement — the money stays frozen either way until a judge decides who it belongs to.
Sourcing
This report is based on primary-source filings in Adv. Proc. No. 26-01285-MAM and Case No. 25-14711-MAM, United States Bankruptcy Court, Southern District of Florida: the Complaint and its exhibits (Doc. 1, 1-2 through 1-4); FC Sioux Falls’ Motion for Preliminary Injunction and supporting declaration (Doc. 2, 2-1); Arguelles/Gatoralex’s Response in Opposition (Doc. 23); Daniel Stermer’s Answer (Doc. 25); the Order Granting Preliminary Injunction (Doc. 28) and Order Granting Extension of Time (Doc. 29); and the docket sheet for Adv. Proc. No. 26-01285-MAM as of September 25, 2026. Allegations drawn from the Complaint are attributed to FC Sioux Falls throughout and remain unproven; Adam Hendry has not yet responded to them in this proceeding. The account of who did and didn’t appear at the September 23 hearing reflects this reporter’s own observation of that hearing and is not drawn from a written transcript or order.
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