NAPA WINEMAKER’S LIFE WAS UNSPOOLING
Bubbling feud with investor came to a head
Robert Dahl came west from Minnesota with a powerful desire to make his fortune in Napa Valley’s famed wine country. And it looked as if he had succeeded — for a while.
The burly, charismatic businessman had convinced friends old and new to invest millions in wine and beer ventures. He lived the high life: fancy dinners and frequent travel, a hillside home and expensive vehicles.
But behind all that seeming success, a bubbling feud with his biggest investor was coming to a head. At noontime Monday, Dahl put a silencer on his .22 calibre semi-automatic handgun and lured the man to his rented vineyard. He chased him through the grapevines with his SUV, then shot him to death in front of police responding to the man’s frantic 911 call.
Dahl, 47, then killed himself, leaving behind his wife, three children and two decades worth of failed projects, broken friendships and numerous accusations of financial impropriety in northern California and Minnesota.
In recent months, Dahl was facing ruinous financial penalties in the $1.2-million dispute with his investor and contempt charges for selling pricey winemaking equipment in defiance of a judge’s order. He was hit by four additional lawsuits last year, including one by planning officials who said he didn’t get the proper permits to operate his four- hectare Dahl Vineyard.
Dahl ran into criminal and financial problems in Minnesota before moving west. After moving to Napa, Dahl launched California Shiners, a company that bottled wine to be sold to customers who added their own labels. One sued Dahl for delivering poor quality wine.
Dahl’s many businesses flamed out quickly and ended in acrimonious disputes with financial backers, according to court records and former partners.
Dahl was introduced to Greg Knittel, a construction developer, and persuaded him to invest in a new brew pub called Napa Point Brewing. Dahl and Knittel opened the pub in October 2013. By March 2014, the landlord alleges in a lawsuit, Dahl stopped paying the rent. Dahl closed the business in May.
Knittel said Dahl liked to display photographs of $800,000 in cash delivered in a gym bag by former Silicon Valley executive Emad Tawfilis last year as part of the loan.
Dahl told Tawfilis that many of those he did business with preferred cash. But after Tawfilis dropped off the cash, he said Dahl stopped making his monthly payments. Tawfilis filed a lawsuit.
The two were meeting Monday to discuss settling the lawsuit when Dahl shot and killed Tawfilis.
On Wednesday, Dahl Vineyards’ tasting room was padlocked and an eviction notice taped to the doors, enumerating a long list of alleged lease violations. In applying to lease the property in 2013, Dahl had told the landlord he was earning millions.
“I have made mistakes in my life and I always take responsibility for them and make them right,” Dahl wrote the landlord. “I pride myself on doing what I say I do and believe that a man is only as good as his word.”