PUNK ROCKER CAUGHT IN SOAP OPERA

The Drummer Is Jailed in O.C. Because His Bottle of Cleanser
Allegedly Contained a Drug. the Manufacturer Joins the Fight.

Was a legendary punk rocker arrested for possession of ... soap?

That's the question surrounding last week's jailing of Germs drummer
Don Bolles after a traffic stop in Newport Beach.

Bolles, 50, whose real name is Jimmy Michael Giorsetti, said in an
interview that he and his girlfriend were driving to an Alcoholics
Anonymous meeting Wednesday evening when police pulled over his 1968
Dodge van for a broken taillight.

Inside the vehicle, police found a toiletry kit containing denture
glue, razors and a bottle of Dr. Bronner's Magic Soap.

When a field test of the alleged liquid peppermint soap indicated it
was GHB, a date-rape drug, Bolles was arrested on suspicion of felony
narcotics possession, said Sgt. Evan Sailor of the Newport Beach
Police Department.

Bolles insisted the soap was only soap. "I've been using Dr.
Bronner's for 35 years," he said Tuesday, adding that the organic
ingredients help give him the complexion of a 15-year-old girl.

Executives at Dr. Bronner's rushed to Bolles' defense, hiring
attorney Bruce Margolin, who specializes in marijuana cases, to
represent the musician.

The alliance between Germs and the soap manufacturer followed an
Internet plea to help bail Bolles out of jail. A musician from one of
his other bands, Fancy Space People, set up a PayPal account to raise
the $2,500 bond.

Bolles, who lives in Huntington Park, was released Sunday. "The
Newport Beach jail was the nicest one I've ever been in," he said.
But Bolles spent just one night there before being moved to two
county jails he described as "terrifying."

The Germs, a trailblazing punk ban formed in Los Angeles in the late
1970s, are credited with influencing generations of musicians and
popularizing mohawks. Bolles took his name from Arizona Republic
journalist Don Bolles, who was killed in 1976 by a car bomb while
investigating corruption.

The band broke up in 1980 after their 24-year-old singer, Darby
Crash, committed suicide. The Germs reunited in 2005.

As word of the punk rocker's arrest spread online, Dr. Bronner's
switchboard lighted up with calls. After speaking with Bolles on
Monday, company President David Bronner decided to intervene.

The Escondido-based soap maker is used to run-ins with the law.
Because the ingredient list for Dr. Bronner's Magic Soap includes
hemp oil, police field tests of the soap occasionally indicate THC,
the active ingredient in marijuana, Bronner said.

But the idea of finding GHB in a Dr. Bronner's product is "beyond
belief," Bronner said. "The field test must have been flawed or tampered with."

Is it possible Bolles was using the soap bottle to carry the drug?

No way, Bronner said. With a definitive test of the bottle's contents
coming soon from the Orange County Crime Lab, "it would be ridiculous
for Bolles to be lying," Bronner said.

Bolles, a onetime heroin addict who is scheduled to play a London
concert with the Germs in August, likewise dismissed the idea that he
would carry GHB. "A date-rape drug is the last thing I need," he
said. "If anything, I need a way to keep the girls off of me. They
make my girlfriend mad."