Owners of buzzy LA restaurant used millions in investor cash to fly in OnlyFans models, splurge on lavish lifestyle: suit

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Three shady businessmen used investor cash to fly in OnlyFans fashions to boost restaurant openings together with different splurges on luxurious vehicles and houses, in keeping with a latest lawsuit.

The three males — Tosh Berman, Michael Tanha and Mahdiar Karamooz — personal Casa Madera in West Hollywood, which prides itself on dealing out “conventional coastal Mexican taste.” The ritzy place is positioned throughout the Mondrian Los Angeles resort on Sundown Boulevard.

Traders allege the boys “deliberately and systematically defrauded” them on a number of events and siphoned cash from the eating places they owned, additionally together with places in Arizona, Nevada and Florida. The traders are consolidated inside corporations Madera Group Investments and Madera Group Holdings, which swimming pools investor cash for funding alternatives.

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“This management group has deliberately and systematically defrauded MGI, MGH, and the opposite members of those LLCs by means of a posh fraudulent design which, amongst different schemes,” the lawsuit says, “siphoned to themselves substantial revenues and monetary advantages realized by means of working varied restaurant institutions whereas foisting the prices and bills incurred to generate such revenues upon the eating places themselves and, in the end, traders in these eating places.”

Berman and Tanha then used the cash for quite a lot of outlandish purchases like flight tickets for OnlyFans fashions and different girls to attend restaurant openings, a $5 million dwelling in Miami, an Aspen ranch, and varied luxurious vehicles together with a white Ferrari and a Maybach SUV.

The 2 males additionally globetrotted. The lawsuit notes pricey and lengthy journeys to Europe, Australia, Dubai and different locations.

Karamooz, when knowledgeable of the flowery purchases, allegedly falsified monetary data to cover the spending.

Mikey Tanha submit on Instagram. Instagram/@mikey.tanha

Tosh Berman in Bali, Indonesia, in a photograph posted to Instagram on January 15, 2025. Instagram/@toshberman

The traders are alleging the boys siphoned any extra income from the eating places, leaving them with little cash-on-hand. They pointed to quite a lot of methods the boys have embezzled the cash together with pocketing $3 million from restaurant low cost firm inKind, which pays institutions for advertising and marketing their reductions to prospects.

As a substitute of utilizing the cash to blunt the impression of the loss attributable to the InKind credit, the boys stored it and compelled the monetary impression onto the traders.

The businessmen additionally allegedly misrepresented the charge they acquired for renting out the Toca Madera Las Vegas for Tremendous Bowls LVII and LVIII in an effort to stuff their pockets with extra money. Within the first occasion, they rented out the place for $1.3 million, however instructed traders they solely acquired $600,000 so they may pocket the remainder of the cash.

For the February 2024 Tremendous Bowl, the boys acquired the identical charge and pocketed an undisclosed quantity.

When the traders requested monetary data from the boys and the eating places in Might 2024, they have been stonewalled. After a second written request, the Toca Madera Scottsdale sued the investor teams, alleging among the traders transferred their shares to 3rd events in violation of its working agreements. The traders denied this declare.

The Scottsdale location produced among the data to “placate” the traders, however they deemed this providing inadequate. The next back-and-forth between traders and the businessmen has led to final week’s lawsuit.

The traders are alleging the boys dedicated securities fraud, filed a RICO cost towards them for alleged racketeering, and quite a lot of different fraud-related fees. They’re looking for damages, possible within the hundreds of thousands, lawyer’s charges, and {that a} belief be positioned over the defendants’ belongings.

Attorneys representing the traders refused to remark when contacted by The Publish, noting it was not “our coverage to not touch upon pending litigation.”