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Bolt’s Silence on Rogers Properties Could Result in Forfeiture to Fed

2 min read

Time is running out for Jim Bolt to attempt to get nearly $1 million worth of his property back.

Bolt, the ex-convict whose “cancer research center” in Rogers was raided in June by the FBI, told Whispers recently that he didn’t know the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District filed civil asset forfeiture lawsuits in early July against three pieces of real estate in Rogers that have ties to him.

And now the Clerk’s Office in the U.S. District Court in Fayetteville has filed a notice that said since no one had filed a response to the government’s lawsuits, the next move for the government should be to file a motion for a default judgment. If the government takes no action, it could result in the lawsuits being dismissed for failure to prosecute.

Bolt said on Aug. 15 that his attorney, Herbert Southern of Fayetteville, would have responses filed by Aug. 16. But as of Thursday, he had not filed a response, although he’s aware of the lawsuits.

Ben Wulff, an assistant U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Arkansas, filed an affidavit that said he emailed the lawsuit to Southern on Wednesday. Southern didn’t return a call for comment.

Bolt said he was waiting for the government’s lawsuits because “that opens the door to us to begin taking depositions of these agents that are investigating the case. And we have a whole bunch of questions to ask them.”

The basis of the seizures can be found in an affidavit filed in the lawsuits that alleged Bolt used fake documents to claim and then sell almost $1.9 million worth of stock that the state of California had listed as unclaimed property.

Bolt hasn’t been charged with a crime, but the property was bought early this year with the money Bolt allegedly fraudulently received, the affidavit said.

The properties are two buildings in the 1200 block of West Poplar Street, including the home of Situs Cancer Research Center, and another building on South Rife Street. “We don’t understand their allegations,” Bolt said. “We don’t understand really what they’re saying or why they’re saying it.”

Bolt said Situs is basically closed because the FBI seized all of its computers in June.

The FBI was supposed to “quickly image the hard drives and return them to us,” Bolt said. “But they haven’t, so I think we’re being harassed.”

A spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District declined comment.

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