Aug 3, 2023Former Wisconsin potato broker sentenced to prison for theft
A former potato broker has been sentenced to six months in prison after pleading guilty to stealing nearly $800,000 from Wisconsin potato farmers and trucking companies.
Thomas J. Lundgren, 60, former owner of Spud City Sales LLC, failed to pay growers for potato sales in 2011 and 2012, according to the criminal complaint. Lundgren pleaded no contest Jan. 30 to four counts of theft of more than $10,000 in a business setting in a plea agreement in which 12 other counts of theft in a business setting were dismissed.
Lundgren, currently of Chico, California, was sentenced July 31. He was also ordered to pay back $125,000 of the $788,000 he owed to growers.
According to the criminal complaint, Lundgren, formerly of Stevens Point, owned Spud City Sales, a go-between business for potato farmers wanting to sell crops to buyers. Between January 2011 and August 2012, Lundgren made sales and then refused to pay the farmers what they were owed.
The victims included farmers and trucking companies in Adams, Columbia, Portage and Waushara counties.
