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lite.cnn.com - on gopher - inofficial
ARTICLE VIEW:
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Police in France and Italy bust gang that sold bottles of fake vintage
wine for $16,000 apiece
By Jack Guy, CNN
Updated:
10:28 AM EDT, Wed October 16, 2024
Source: CNN
Six people have been arrested as part of an investigation into a that
allegedly sold fake French wine for up to €15,000 ($16,300) per
bottle.
Police in Italy searched 14 properties and seized large amounts of
wine, wine bottles, counterfeit stickers from top French vineyards and
machines used to recap bottles, according to a statement from European
law enforcement agency Europol, published Tuesday.
Police also seized electronic equipment worth €1.4 million ($1.5
million) and more than €100,000 ($109,000) in cash.
“The fake wine was forged in Italy, then delivered to an Italian
airport and exported for sale at market value all over the world by
honest wine traders,” Europol said in the statement.
The techniques used by the counterfeiters revealed a link to a previous
investigation involving a Russian fraudster, which was closed in 2015,
Europol said.
According to a statement from French prosecutors published Tuesday, a
40-year-old Russian man, who had already been convicted for his part in
a similar wine fraud under a different identity, has been implicated in
the latest investigation.
Prosecutors said the network had managed to sell a “large volume of
French grands crus” valued at more than €2 million ($2.18 million).
A judge in the French city of Dijon has indicted a French national on
fraud and money laundering charges, and the Russian national will
appear in front of the same judge with a view to indicting him,
according to the statement.
This investigation was led by the French Gendarmerie, and also involved
Italy’s Carabinieri and Swiss Federal Police.
Stuart George, founder and managing director of Arden Fine Wines, a
London-based wine merchant that specializes in fine and rare vintage
wines, said that “it is challenging to find accurate figures on fine
wine fraud because it is an activity that by its very nature is covert
and deceitful.”
Nonetheless, market forces have driven interest in wine fraud.
“The surge in demand for fine wine in the 21st century… has
motivated fraudsters,” George told CNN. “Anything that is valuable,
whether it is a painting or a bottle of wine, is in danger of being
faked.”
Fraudsters are able to take advantage of a lack of specialist
knowledge, he added.
“Essentially, most people can’t tell real from not real,” said
George. “If somebody has never seen a genuine bottle of, say, Petrus
1990, then it’s impossible to know when a counterfeit has been
presented.”
Improving skills in the industry is one way of combating wine fraud, he
added.
“Better training and better knowledge of what bottles of fine wine
– and especially old bottles of fine wine – really look like would
be useful,” said George. “Ultimately, it comes down to integrity
and competence.”
In October 2020, Italian police broke up a ring producing counterfeit
Sassicaia wine, a variety considered among the finest in the world,
which sells for hundreds of euros a bottle, Reuters reported.
Bolgheri Sassicaia red wine comes from an area on the coast of Tuscany
and has become one of Italy’s best-known fine wines since it appeared
on the market in the 1970s.
Officials from the Guardia di Finanza said the sophisticated
counterfeit operation bottled inferior wine from Sicily in a warehouse
near Milan, with meticulously reproduced labeling and cases that came
from Bulgaria.
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