Steve McBee Sr., the Missouri farmer and star of Bravo’s The McBee Dynasty: Real American Cowboys, has agreed to pay the federal government more than $7.1 million in connection with his guilty plea to crop insurance fraud. The settlement agreement was filed by the United States Attorney for the Western District of Missouri on Thursday, October 22, weeks after McBee, 54, left federal prison.
What he owes
The terms call for a forfeiture money judgment of $3,158,923 and $4,022,124 in restitution to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Within 14 days of the settlement McBee must pay at least $300,000 of the forfeiture amount. The rest is due no later than 10 months after the settlement date. The government’s right to collect the restitution stays in force.
The numbers are not simply additive in practice. Attorney John Ross Glover told PEOPLE that the McBees will pay $3.1 million, and that sum will be credited against the restitution and reduce it by the same amount. He also said the family is happy to put the matter behind them and that the McBees deny any wrongdoing alleged in the civil action.
The fraud itself
According to a Department of Justice press release, McBee falsified reports from the owners of McBee Farming Operations. That let him collect $2,605,943 in federal crop insurance benefits and $552,980 in premium subsidies, a total of $3,158,923 in unauthorized benefits. He pleaded guilty in 2024. In October 2025, U.S. District Judge Stephen R. Bough sentenced him to 24 months in prison followed by two years of supervised release. He was released early in September after nine months. Afterward he posted an Instagram clip of life outdoors set to John Denver’s “Take Me Home, Country Roads,” and wrote that he had “a little more appreciation for the simple things in life.”
The transfers to his sons
The strategic question for prosecutors was where the assets had gone. A separate federal lawsuit, filed after the sentencing, alleged that McBee shifted interests in three family companies to his sons Jesse and Cole to keep them out of reach. The timeline in the complaint runs like this:
McBee learned of the federal investigation in June 2023, and his attorney met with prosecutors that December. On January 7, 2024, he moved a 39 percent stake in McBee Properties L.C. and 99 percent stakes in Rock Bluff Development LLC and S&K Enterprises LLC to the two sons, split evenly, and received no payment. He pleaded guilty in November 2024.
The government argued the transfers were made with intent to defraud it and without equivalent value, while McBee knew he would face debts he could not pay. The suit made six fraudulent-conveyance claims under federal and Missouri law. It asked the court to void the transfers, to bar anyone from selling or mortgaging the business assets, and to enter money judgments against Jesse and Cole.
A trial called off
Judge Bough has now cancelled an April 6, 2027 pretrial conference and a jury trial set for May 3, 2027, noting that the court had been told of the parties’ intent to settle. The sides must file a stipulation of dismissal or a joint status report within 45 days, and a status report is due by December 5, 2026. Under McBee’s plea agreement, the government agreed not to charge anyone else in his family with crop insurance fraud.
Sources
- “McBee Dynasty”’s Steve McBee Sr. Agreed to Pay over $7.1 Million in Crop Insurance Fraud Case – AOL
- Steve McQueen
- McBee, Sons Move to Settle Suit Over Transfers Linked to Crop Insurance Fraud
Photo: no one cares / Unsplash (Unsplash License)
