Disclosure: WeedPress publisher Jason Karimi, who wrote this article, is a party to pending litigation with Melissa Mentele, co-founder and chief operations officer of 605 Cannabis, who is discussed in this article. That litigation, Mentele v. Karimi, No. 49TPO26-000343, is on appeal to the South Dakota Supreme Court and is not the subject of this article. He is not a party to Hornidge v. Mentele, No. 30CIV25-000032, or State v. Brent J. Mentele, No. 30CRI23-000051, which this article also discusses. Factual statements here are drawn from the public records cited in the notes. Readers should weigh his interest accordingly. Corrections: weedpressnewstips@gmail.com.
8. You can’t beat a plan with no plan.
16. A well-run movement takes care of its own.
18. You can’t save the world if you can’t pay the rent. https://youtu.be/tAJyXcuZlRs?is=Ns89-Fpj72vobJKM
Reports state that the for-profit company associated with the far-left radicals at New Approach South Dakota is approximately $800,000 behind on rent at its cultivation facility.¹ No public court filing or Department of Health document currently confirms that amount.² What is on the public record is a set of personal legal matters involving New Approach South Dakota, together with a pattern of temporary protective order filings against this outlet that multiple South Dakota courts have repeatedly rejected. New Approach is currently appealing to the Court of Appeals to censor WeedPress reports from exposing lies to the public about business and financial and criminal matters distracting the (dishonest and social security disability collecting while admittedly running/owning and directing a for-profit business) owners at the “non-profit” New Approach focus from helping patients to having patients asking questions feel intimidated into silence. New Approach’s public libel has failed so far to stop public interest policy reporting here at WeedPress instead driving a whopping 80,000 readers to WeedPress in one month, July 2026. Weedpress, is South Dakota’s only current non-profit independent advocacy organization without business interests compromising our truth seeking, records uncovering, testimony in Pierre at hearings, and speaking up for patients over business/industry idiocy.
Public court indices show a foreclosure action in Hanson County naming Melissa Mentele and Brent Mentele as defendants.³ A separate Hanson County criminal case charged Brent Mentele with domestic assault; public summaries describe the victim as his wife, Melissa Mentele, and reference an order for alcohol evaluation.⁴ Court records show the case was terminated on Jan. 24, 2024, by a deferred prosecution agreement and dismissal. These matters sit alongside earlier debt-collection proceedings involving Melissa Mentele.⁵
Mentele has also filed at least four temporary protective order petitions against the author of WeedPress across two counties.⁶ All were denied after evidentiary hearings for failure to meet the statutory standard.⁷ One temporary order was granted and later vacated; the most recent denial is now on appeal.⁸ The filings followed WeedPress reporting on the regulatory history and inspection outcomes of the company associated with New Approach South Dakota.⁹ Courts have treated the petitions as insufficient under South Dakota’s protective-order statutes.¹⁰
In the third court hearing against WeedPress Mentele was caught lying to the judge. The judge slammed her for lacking credibiiity and changing her story to hide her business ownership status while collecting social security disability. Principles matter. Lying is wrong. Children know that. Lying to judges and businesses leads to bankruptcy for you and your business partners and investors. Principles matter to most people in small states.
In 2023 that company sued the Department of Health after an inspection led to an emergency suspension and product recall, alleging more than $1 million in damages.¹¹ A settlement later lifted the suspension.¹² Subsequent inspection reports remain posted by the Department.¹³ Mentele has been publicly identified with New Approach South Dakota, the group that sponsored Initiated Measure 26.¹⁴
In 2024, a Facebook post proclaimed New Approach was $500,000 short on needed funding to win a recreational cannabis campaign. The campaign lost by 11 points, which is usually impossible to come back from in political ballot initiative loss margins. After the failed ballot initiative, it was also admitted during a live online stream recorded by WeedPress that Nee Approach also lacked grassroots networks and volunteers statewide due to being busy running business arms of New Approach affiliate for profit businesses.
The combination of a circulating allegation of an $800,000 rent arrearage, active foreclosure proceedings, a 2023 domestic-assault case involving company leadership (dismissed in 2024 under a deferred prosecution agreement), and repeated protective-order filings that failed in court raises ordinary questions about financial stability and the use of legal process against public commentary by individuals associated with New Approach. Those questions can be tested with the same tools used for other program issues: public records requests directed at the appropriate custodians, and publication of whatever response, or non-response, arrives.
Until a public record establishes the rent figure, it remains an industry report.
The foreclosure case, the domestic-assault charge, and the protective-order denials are already on the docket.
WeedPress will continue to publish the records as they are filed.
These reports of criminal arrests and financial failures by self-declared “leadership” (apparently allegations of business fraud is involved as well and will be reported on once our deep dive investigation is complete) concern the future of cannabis advocacy in South Dakota. A documented and well-known pattern of lying to the public, blocking MMOC board members from discussing the public lies on New Approach Facebook pages, and generally pissing everyone off at Pierre’s Capitol by being jackasses and starting personality conflicts to hide financial mismanagement at their company will continue to be documented closely so the public and sick vulnerable patients can be warned New Approach is, in my opinion, nothing more than a profit-greedy atheistic anti-Christian demonic group of predatory hateful liars, and hurting patients or getting their husband arrested for domestic assault is their strategy if it makes their failures look better and silences accountability. They’re clearly financially ruined with no hope for recovery. Do not donate money or trust they have the ground game and network to continue asking for and managing millions of fundraiser dollars for legalization efforts. They lost by 11 points in the last election, and if they are granted a third chance to lead legalization in 2028, South Dakota will never legalize cannabis.
New Approach South Dakota is welcome to respond and clarify circulating community questions about financial stability and grassroots organizational capacity following a massive electoral loss at the ballot box due to their financial shortfalls and lack of organizational capacity. So far, any individual in South Dakota pointing out New Approach is a failure as a vehicle for lobbying and legalizing marijuana politically, is met with public verbal assaults, delusional imaginary lies, and a lack of basic communications and reading comprehension capabilities that once witnessed in real time, explains why lawmakers at Pierre, and industry lobbyists working on cannabis advocacy, are tired of the repeated loser moves by New Approach and, if house foreclosure and business debts turn out to be true, then one question must be asked:
Is New Approach South Dakota hiding financial problems from the public to then ask for money to lose another election for recreational cannabis, so they can take the money and fundraising and media attention and use lobbying efforts to shore up bad business accounts? And what’s this about product issues with their company and some comments to WeedPress about the business community being sick of the lobbyist-business axis of fund seekers who can’t manage a business and just lost a vote to legalize South Dakota by an astronomical 11 freaking percentage points?
Stay tuned. The one thing I can confirm for certain: if you never want to see South Dakota legalize marijuana, and you want to keep marijuana illegal, then let New Approach keep asking for money, power, and influence. They have not only less than zero percent chance of legalizing marijuana, but a reputation in Pierre so awful, that their involvement will see the vote loss be even worse than when New Approach lost by 11 points in the last voter initiative to (fail to) legalize marijuana.
Maybe SAM should send New Approach money for doing such an amazing, wonderful job at lying to the public about their effectiveness and basic numbers, while simultaneously ensuring marijuana stays illegal, and everyone goes bankrupt, as a result. God knows they could use the financial charity, what with New Approach collecting social security disability while running a failing cannabis business and all. This house of cards has to soon finally account to the real personal problem they wish to offload onto patients: their inability to pay the “non-profit” New Approach owned business rent and mortgage.
Allegedly.
Correction (Oct. 26, 2026): An earlier version of this post did not state the disposition of Hanson County case 30CRI23-000051. Court records show the case was terminated on Jan. 24, 2024, by a deferred prosecution agreement and dismissal.
Related coverage
- 605 Cannabis Principal Raised Social Security Disability in Court While Fighting Foreclosure on Emery Home
- 605 Cannabis LLC Products Pulled From Shelves At 9 Fed Up Dispensaries In South Dakota.
- New Approach South Dakota Goes Quiet on Advocacy While Mentele Stays Active on a Blocked Profile
- WeedPress Appellee Brief, Melissa Mentele v. Jason Karimi, South Dakota Supreme Court, July 15, 2026
- “We Are In A Courtroom. This Isn’t Facebook.” Judge Rejects Mentele’s Claims
- New Approach South Dakota’s Damaged Credibility, Lies To Judges To Get Political Competitor Arrested: Court Transcripts
- New Approach South Dakota Pivots And Rebrands With New Leadership Amid Ongoing Concerns
- Public Records Show Two Civil Cases Involving 605 Cannabis Executive; Questions of Transparency Follow For Reform Leadership
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Footnotes
¹ Industry insider source tip concern conveyed to author (Oct. 2026).
² Author’s review of publicly available Department of Health inspection reports and court indices as of Oct. 20, 2026.
³ Deborah E. Hornidge & John Hornidge v. Melissa Mentele, Brent Mentele, et al., No. 30CIV25-000032 (Hanson Cnty. Cir. Ct. filed July 28, 2025).
⁴ State of South Dakota v. Brent J. Mentele, 30CRI23-000051 (Hanson County Circuit Court) (domestic abuse–simple assault; public index summaries describe victim as spouse Melissa Mentele of New Approach South Dakota and references alcohol evaluation). Mentele responded publicly that HIPAA protects her husbands recent alcohol abuse and domestic assault charge.
⁵ See, e.g., Midland Credit Management Inc. v. Melissa Mentele, Hanson County Circuit Court (2025).
⁶ Jason Karimi, How South Dakota’s New Anti-SLAPP Law Would Have Ended Abusive SLAPP Filings From Melissa Mentele, WeedPress (July 7, 2026), https://weedpress.org/2026/07/07/how-south-dakotas-new-anti-slapp-law-would-have-ended-abusive-slapp-filings-from-melissa-mentele/.
⁷ Id.
⁸ Id.
⁹ Jason Karimi, 605 Cannabis LLC, Public Oversight, and Program Integrity, WeedPress (May 1, 2026), https://weedpress.org/2026/05/01/605-cannabis-llc-public-oversight-and-program-integrity-a-public-records-timeline-for-south-dakotas-medical-cannabis-program/.
¹⁰ Karimi, supra note 6.
¹¹ Jacob Newton, 605 Cannabis sues South Dakota Department of Health, KELOLAND (Mar. 31, 2023), https://www.keloland.com/keloland-com-original/605-cannabis-sues-south-dakota-department-of-health/.
¹² South Dakota Department of Health settles with 605 Cannabis, suspension lifted, KELOLAND (July 21, 2023).
¹³ S.D. Dep’t of Health, Medical Cannabis Establishment Inspection Report, 605 Cannabis (Worthing) (July 1, 2026).
¹⁴ New Approach South Dakota materials and public statements identifying Melissa Mentele with the group that sponsored Initiated Measure 26
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