Thousands of seized collectibles up for auction

Thousands of collectibles have been seized from properties belonging to Nicholas John Felgate, including everything from rock 'n' roll memorabilia to comic books.

Rene Hajas from North American Auction is surprised at just how many items are involved.

"We work directly for the Civil Enforcement Agency," he said.

"We went and we removed two households with a large storage facility and we didn't get out till four o'clock in the morning, just because of the vast amount of stuff."

Hajas says it took hours to sort everything out and then photograph and catalogue it all for the auction. There are more than 3,000 lots up for grabs.

"Everything he bought — 98 per cent of it was an appreciating asset, it's a collectible," he said.

"I mean, they only made so many of them — there's only going to be so many around. If he was collecting pins, he had hundreds of them. It's extraordinary how much this person has collected over the years."

The Alberta Securities Commission (ASC) says Felgate allegedly raised more than $2 million combined from 11 investors through fraudulent methods between January 2015 and the summer of 2018.

His case is still before the courts and the ASC can't comment on it specifically, but says its mandate is to protect investors and foster a fair and efficient capital market in Alberta.

The commission is currently working to collect fines from Felgate totalling almost $100,000.

The ASC says in appropriate cases it will try to recover funds or other assets that have been transferred in an attempt to hide assets from having them seized and sold.

It says any proceeds recovered through Civil Enforcement Act processes and sold at auction are held and shared among all judgment creditors.

Felgate's next court date is scheduled for Sept. 16 and his trial is currently set to begin Jan. 9.

Hajas says there are deals to be had at the unreserved auction and ultimately the people bidding determine the prices.

"Some of these pieces haven't traded in a while because there's only so many of them (in existence)," he said.

"It's called collecting, it's not called selling, so that's rare when this comes up when you're actually selling so many different collectible items. There's going to be a lot of happy buyers."

More information about the auction is available at www.naa.bid.