A Chinese associate of former First Son Hunter Biden paid $100,000 to an elderly Maine woman in a failed bid to establish a massive cannabis cultivation facility in the remote town of Staceyville, the Robinson Report has learned.
“My family was in debt, and that was a lot of money,” 70-year-old Vonalee Sides, the town agent for Staceyville, said in a phone interview.
“I’m 70 years old, and back then, I guess I didn’t know what I was getting into,” said Sides.
Sides is listed in Secretary of State records and Office of Cannabis Policy (OCP) records as the president of Sherman Growth, Inc., a company that was incorporated in Dec. 2019 and applied for a Tier-4 Adult Use cannabis cultivation license. Sides was later removed from the corporation’s filings by Yan’s attorney.
Mervyn Yan, who testified before the House Oversight Committee regarding large payments he made to Hunter Biden and President Joe Biden’s brother, James Biden, was the principal behind Sherman Growth, Inc., a business incorporated in December 2019.
The timing of the incorporation of Sherman Growth came just months before Maine’s legal marijuana program — green-lighted by Gov. Janet Mills and Democratic lawmakers — would begin in 2020.
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Vonalee Sides, the 70-year-old town agent for Staceyville, is listed in both Secretary of State records and Office of Cannabis Policy records as a partner in Sherman growth alongside Yan.
Yan’s attorney, former Democratic Rep. Lynne Williams of Bar Harbor, filed the incorporation documents on Yan’s behalf and was listed as the treasurer.
On April 23, 2022, Williams filed restated articles of incorporation stripping Sides from the company, clarifying that Yan was the sole owner of all 10,000 shares of the company, and listing herself as clerk and treasurer.
Williams, who disclosed to this reporter on a previous occasion that she represented an unlicensed marijuana grower in Eastport, has since been stripped of her law license for misconduct.
According to a Jan. 25 story, she is reportedly living in a senior living facility in Portland. She could not be reached for comment. Despite her current circumstances, Sherman Growth’s 2025 annual report was filed under her name and address prior to the April 1, 2025 deadline, and the company remains active in the eyes of the state.
It’s unclear where things went wrong with Yan’s plan to build a massive marijuana grow in northern Penobscot County.
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Five years in to Maine’s adventure with legalized cannabis, Tier 4 cultivation businesses remain somewhat rare. Tier-4 is the largest license, in terms of plant count, that Maine offers for cannabis cultivation. Despite the proliferation of marijuana businesses across the state, Maine still has just nine Tier-4 cannabis cultivation operations, according to OCP records.
Had he received the Adult Use Tier-4 cultivation license, Sherman Growth would have been permitted to grow 20,000 plants or more, making it one of the largest legal cannabis enterprises in New England.
Yan was never successful in his bid to acquire the mill property in Staceyville, and it doesn’t appear that OCP ever approved his license application.
But Yan’s attempted entry into Maine’s cannabis world is remarkable nonetheless.
At the time he was agreeing to pay the town manager of Staceyville a whopping $100,000, he was a business associate to the brother and son of the President of the United States.
Yan also has direct ties to the Chinese Communist Party vis-a-vis CEFC, which is significant considering Chinese organized crime — including individuals with documented ties to the CCP’s United Front — was proliferating throughout rural Maine during the Biden presidency.
According to a leaked memo from the Department of Homeland Security, the federal government assessed in early 2023 that more than 270 properties in Maine were controlled by Asian Transnational Criminal Organizations primarily for the purposes of black-market cannabis trafficking.
The Maine Wire’s Triad Weed investigation has independently identified more than 350 facilities throughout the state that have operated as part of the clandestine drug trafficking business.
In early July, seven Chinese nationals were indicted in the District of Massachusetts for their alleged role in a human trafficking and drug trafficking operation that included grow operations in Massachusetts.
Yan, who appears to live in Brooklyn, New York, was previously involved with a Massachusetts cannabis business called Columbia Growth, Inc.
Records available from Massachusett’s cannabis regulatory agency show that Yan applied for a cannabis cultivation license in June 2021 and received a provisional approval. He was in the advanced stages of obtaining approval to operate when the effort lost momentum.
According to documents filed with the Bay State’s Cannabis Control Commission (CCC), Yan and his business partner, Heng Wang, projected the Lee-based pot grow would earn $135 million per year when operating at full capacity.
That’s a significant projected return, considering Yan and Wang disclosed investments worth, respectively, $400,000 and $600,000 in the enterprise.
Like the Sherman Growth scheme, Yan’s Massachusetts business also centered around a renovation of an old paper mill building, and like his Maine business, Columbia Growth stalled.
But how did a 70-year-old woman living in a town of 372 people connect with Chinese-communist linked fixer more accustomed to wiring money to Hunter and James Biden?
Sides wouldn’t divulge who connected her with Yan, other than to say the individual was previously associated with the mill made the introduction and claimed they couldn’t take the $100,000 themselves because doing so would violate their religious convictions.
Sides said she was approached by this individual and asked if she’d sign her name as president of Sherman Growth. But Sides explained in a phone interview that she was only affiliated with the company “on paper” and was paid the $100,000 for allowing Yan to use her name to submit the application to OCP.
She recalled getting fingerprinted as part of the process to apply for an adult use cannabis cultivation permit and was paid as a contractor. She received the money in monthly installments, which she dutifully paid taxes on, she said.
As Sides understood it, her name was necessary for Yan to get around a rule in Maine’s original cannabis legalization scheme that require businesses to be owned or run by Maine residents.
According to Sides, Yan’s plan was to purchase the old mill building and turn it into a massive marijuana grow. Had he received the Adult Use Tier-4 cultivation license, Sherman Growth would have been permitted to grow 20,000 plants or more. Tier-4 is the largest license, in terms of plant count, that Maine offers for cannabis cultivation. Despite the proliferation of licensed cannabis businesses across the state since 2020, Maine still has just nine Tier-4 cannabis cultivation operations, according to Office of Cannabis Policy (OCP) records.
According to Sides, Yan’s plan was to purchase the old mill building and turn it into a massive marijuana grow. The mill, known to locals as the “Wheelabrator Mill,” was owned by Wheelabrator Sherman Energy Co. until it was sold to Boralax Sherman LLC in 2006.
The property is currently owned by Sherman Development, LLC, a Niagra, Wisconsin. According to Maine corporate records, the directors of Sherman Development, LLC, are Yong Liu and Jianjun Deng, both of Manalapan, New Jersey.
He’s also currently described as the director of Longship Berkshire Corporation, which shares an address with Yan and Coldharbour Capital in Brooklyn.
Mervyn Yan, Hunter Biden, and the PRC’s CEFC
CEFC China Energy was a major Chinese conglomerate founded in 2002 by Ye Jianming. The company, which is financed by Chinese state-run banks and subject to Chinese laws granting the Communist Party control over China-based companies, came to the attention of congressional investigators and the American media as the result of huge payments funneled through CEFC to Hunter Biden and James Biden.
In the middle of the CCP-backed corporations payments to the Biden family was Mervyn Yan, who served as a facilitator of payments to President Biden’s kin.
Yan’s relationship with the Biden men emerged during congressional investigations into Hunter Biden’s finances, with much of financial dealings first disclosed as the result of Hunter Biden’s infamous laptop. The investigations into Hunter Biden’s relationship with Mervyn Yan culminated in Yan receiving a subpoena to appear before the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability.
During the resulting testimony, Yan discussed large payments he’d brokered between CEFC, the Chinese state-run energy company, and Hunter and James Biden, the then-president’s son and brother.
According to the transcript of the interview with Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), Yan first met Hunter Biden in May 2017, introduced by Gongwen “Kevin” Dong, and they discussed working together on infrastructure and energy deals involving CEFC China Energy, one of the top “privately-operated” companies in the PRC.
Yan and Hunter Biden would go on to have a business relationship that was lucrative for Owasco PC, an entity controlled by Biden, and Hudson West III, a joint venture between Yan and Owasco PC.
Yan met James Biden at the same May 2017 meeting with Hunter Biden and Gongwen Dong, where James introduced himself as Hunter’s uncle; Yan later had business interactions with James Biden, including reimbursing expenses submitted by Lion Hall Group (James Biden’s firm) as part of the Hudson West III joint venture.
Yan described himself as the “on-the-ground person” executing deals for Dong, while Hunter Biden was positioned to source opportunities.
In practice, the web of corporations facilitated the flow of money from CEFC to the Biden family for services that remain nebulous. That money flow stoked concerns from congressional Republicans that entities controlled by the Chinese Communist Party were attempting to influence U.S. policy by buying favors with the president’s ethically malleable family.
From that May 2017 meeting on, the business relationship between Yan and the Bidens became deep and complex. As far as congressional investigators were able to determine, more than one million dollars flowed from Yan’s business entities to President Biden’s closest family members.
Yan did not directly give money to the Bidens but facilitated reimbursements through Hudson West III; for example, Hudson West III wired $33,941.11 to Lion Hall Group on April 3, 2018, for “office expense and reimbursement,” while Yan was a signatory, according to records released by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa).
Money was moved primarily via domestic wire transfers from Hudson West III’s Cathay Bank account, where Yan was a signatory; funds originated from CEFC-linked entities like Hudson West V (controlled by Gongwen Dong) and were disbursed to Owasco (Hunter) and Lion Hall (James) for expenses under the joint venture agreement.
Total reimbursements from Hudson West III to Lion Hall Group (James Biden) included approximately $1.4 million across about 20 wires from August 2017 to September 2018, often labeled as “office expense and reimbursement”; specific examples include $18,000 in January 2018 and $34,000 in April 2018.
Yan had direct contact with Sara Biden (James Biden’s wife) via emails regarding Lion Hall Group’s expenses, taxes, and W-9 forms for Hudson West III, despite initially claiming no relationship with her beyond brief meetings; he emailed Sara Biden on January 29, 2019, requesting W-9 forms for Lion Hall and Owasco.
Yan became a signatory on the Hudson West III bank account at Cathay Bank on March 31, 2018, and facilitated withdrawals and reimbursements, including payments to Lion Hall Group for business expenses equivalent to those for Owasco.
Yan signed an Assignment and Assumption of Interest agreement on behalf of Coldharbour Capital LLC with Hunter Biden (on behalf of Owasco PC and Hudson West III) and Gongwen Dong (on behalf of Hudson West V) in 2018, transferring interests related to CEFC deals.
Yan and Biden were both 50 percent partners in a venture called Hudson West III, with Biden signing on behalf of Owasco PC and Yan signing for Coldharbour Capital LLC.
Yan’s Coldharbour Capital LLC received multiple wires from Hudson West III, including $20,833.34 on April 3, 2018, and $6,667 on April 2, 2018 (for Jiaqi Bao, another associate), as part of ongoing reimbursements and salaries; these were funded by CEFC-linked entities.
According to records released by congressional Republicans, CEFC paid the Bidens through Hudson West III to leverage their connections for U.S. energy sector access and deals; CEFC’s mission was to serve China’s national energy strategy, including overseas investments, and the Bidens provided in-roads for CEFC to pursue projects like LNG terminals, potentially allowing CEFC equity in U.S. assets and exporting resources to China.
Nothing in the materials released by congressional Republicans mention Yan’s apparent interest in Maine’s cannabis industry, and it’s unclear whether the New York entrepreneur with connections to CCP-controlled companies and the First Family remained involved in Maine ventures after Sherman Growth never came to fruition.
