Ben Elliott, the former Hoedowns proprietor, faces increasing legal scrutiny after armed federal agents executed search warrants at a business he owns in Winchester, Tenn., where Elliott now resides with his wife.
Local law enforcement officials helped 25 federal agents search Elliott’s Elk River Printers on March 20, local television station WAFF 48 reported. No one was arrested.
FBI Spokesperson Stephen Emmett confirmed the search and investigation.
"Since it is an ongoing fraud-based investigation, we are not going to be able to discuss the matter any further at this time," he said.
Elliott left Atlanta in a cloud of controversy last summer after Hoedowns, the popular gay country bar where his family had become the majority shareholder, closed abruptly Aug. 13. A Fulton County State Court judge issued an "Order for Immediate Writ of Possession” to another shareholder who put up most of the money for the bar and had not received scheduled payments.
Southern Voice reported last summer that Elliott faced two civil lawsuits and a federal investigation centered on allegations that he used a direct mail business to make multiple unauthorized withdrawals, totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars, from the bank accounts of car dealerships that had been his clients.
"I would like to make the very strong point that I have never done anything or taken any action against any dealer to collect, to litigate, to do anything that I haven't been advised by more than one lawyer … that what I was doing was in fact legal and was within my rights," Elliott said then.
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