During the trial of Kaleb Charters, a manual laborer at one of Atre’s marijuana farms, a former manager named Sam Borghese testified that Atre maintained a “hostile, fear-based” working culture. Borghese told the court that Atre — who had a net worth of some $16 million — regularly withheld his worker’s paychecks, dangling petty grievances over their heads at random.

The employee further testified that Atre would regularly berate the workers whose labor built his fortunes, and fire them when they didn’t show him the proper respect. Borghese reportedly answered over 100 questions related to Atre’s cruelty, adding that his workers made a habit of “joking” about teaming up to rob and hurt the CEO.