RUDY KURNIAWAN & GLOBAL WINE AUCTION FRAUD THREAD (MERGED)

[todd waldmann]

.

[dcornutt]

I was at La Paulee in SF a few years ago.
Rudy opened a 3L of 1978 La Tache at an after party. I was there for a quick moment. Everyone seemed to like the wine but I knew it was fake. It was at least off. I talked to a VERY well known Burgundian who took up for Rudy and felt the bottle was ok.
It was obvious that this person really loved Rudy's passion and love for Burgundy. This person has a Burgundy palate that is on the level of Allen's.
I have to tell you it was infectious.
Please don't persecute folks for getting caught up in this with innocent motives. Many didn't seem to be promoting Rudy.
Just my take on this affair.
Those who helped with the deception should be taken to task.
The innocents should be given a chance to salvage. We all make mistakes in judgement. You just hope it isn't fatal.

[todd waldmann]

I was at La Paulee in SF a few years ago.
Rudy opened a 3L of 1978 La Tache at an after party. I was there for a quick moment. Everyone seemed to like the wine but I knew it was fake. It was at least off. I talked to a VERY well known Burgundian who took up for Rudy and felt the bottle was ok.
It was obvious that this person really loved Rudy's passion and love for Burgundy. This person has a Burgundy palate that is on the level of Allen's.
I have to tell you it was infectious.
Please don't persecute folks for getting caught up in this with innocent motives. Many didn't seem to be promoting Rudy.
Just my take on this affair.
Those who helped with the deception should be taken to task.
The innocents should be given a chance to salvage. We all make mistakes in judgement. You just hope it isn't fatal.

Your common sense point of view is refreshing Don.

[Ryan Caughey]

I would like to reply to Don’s comments quickly and completely on behalf of myself and my employer, Heritage Auctions. Everything written below is categorically and demonstrably true.

Throughout my career I have maintained a commitment to honest business and there are many who can bear witness to that fact, including Maureen Downey and Don Cornwell, but let me first shoot the elephant in the room and state that Antonio Castanos did have a consignment in last year’s June auction # 5084 which Heritage executed on behalf of Greg Martin Auctions. Let me also be clear that Heritage did not solicit or contract that consignment, nor did we have the opportunity to inspect the wine prior to producing the catalog. Shortly after our wonderful single-owner auction in May, I was informed that Heritage might soon be acquiring another auction house with an already-made wine sale. Several days later I was told that we were going to move forward and that I needed to prepare a catalog for print within 4 days time. By then, Greg Martin Auctions (GMA) had a finished catalog ready to go to print, had already purchased advertising and had already rented the ballroom at Island Shangri-La in Hong Kong for the event. This sale was finished long before Heritage was involved.

The consignment spanning between lots 274-314 belonged to Antonio Castanos. There were just 8 bottles in total that fit the pattern of suspicious wines which have been described repeatedly in this thread. They were: an Imperial of ’86 Lafleur, a magnum of ‘89 Le Pin, a double magnum of ’98 Le Pin, two bottles of ’71 Romanee Conti and 3 bottles of ’78 Jayer Richebourg. Readers should note that these 8 lots clearly stand out from the rest of the consignment by miles, since also included were two cases of 2000 Boyd Cantenac, a fair bit of modern vintage Leoville Barton, a case of ’93 Trotanoy and a fair bit of Araujo, along with some modern first growths. It was immediately and abundantly clear that these items would need to bear intense scrutiny when we finally physically received the property. We were assured that the wines had been inspected, analyzed and represented accurately. With these assurances in place and with the understanding that we would have the opportunity to inspect the wines prior to the auction, the catalog went to print and mailed on time.

A week or so later, the property arrived in our warehouse and we began the work of breaking down the inventory and reassembling the lots to reflect our catalog. During this process my team was under clear instructions that there were lots which I would need to inspect as they were found, or if I was not immediately available, that would need to be set aside for me to inspect later on. I personally inspected every high-profile bottle in this sale and executed due diligence myself. I was singularly responsible for making decisions about whether a wine passed muster or if it was NFA (not for auction), though I did consult Poppy Davis and others for help with the vetting process. During this process we did find wines which we believed to be counterfeit and they were all withdrawn, without exception, on the spot. I contacted several consignors regarding a number of lots that I found suspicious or deserving of added attention. In cases where we were less certain we gave those lots more elaborate treatment, including a case of 1966 Romanee Conti of which we took several photographs which were emailed to Wilson Daniels for assistance. In perfect candor, the lot was sold before Wilson Daniels responded. I was in direct contact with the winning bidder before and after the auction, acknowledged that we were still working on the item and ultimately gave him the option of keeping or refusing the lot - even before the response came. Wilson Daniels eventually replied that there were abnormalities, that those abnormalities were not conclusive and that the ultimate proof could only come from tasting. The buyer was notified, decided he was uncomfortable and the lot was removed from his invoice immediately as per Heritage policy. These bottles were not consigned by Antonio Castanos.

There is a ton of additional evidence that we vetted that Greg Martin auction very carefully and I remain 100% convinced that our conduct is beyond reproach. I would prefer to say that I never auctioned wines consigned by Antonio Castanos, but I can say that we were placed in a difficult position and we did our absolute best to navigate it with the highest ethical standards. In the spirit of complete transparency I will report that the two bottles of 1971 Romanee Conti are most likely counterfeit. They were initially invoiced to the same bidder who had won the case of the 1966 Romanee Conti and both sales were cancelled by Heritage. I believe the magnum of Le Pin is authentic but it was returned to us because the cork was ever so slightly protruding. We never questioned the buyer’s decision to cancel that sale. Everything else in this consignment was concluded to be genuine and delivered accordingly. The clearest indicator of our commitment to authenticity and excellence came nearly a year after that auction, after this thread began. We went back and looked at every photograph we had on file of every high-risk wine we have sold since our very first auction. We compared all DRC photos to the details Don identified in his early posts (and a copy of that post is taped to all our inspection tables for reference) and in doing so we came upon photos of a 1972 Romanee Conti which appeared to have a mis-cut neck label. I personally contacted that buyer to explain our findings though by all accounts the evidence is not conclusively damning. Though we believe the bottle to be authentic we provided the opportunity to cancel the sale knowing we would take the loss squarely in our pocket. The buyer to date has not replied though I have sent a follow-up email and two text messages.

I would like to finally call attention to a post I made on this bulletin board on April 2, 2011. http://wineberserkers.com/forum/viewtop ... =1&t=43956. Readers will note that this timing corresponds with my first auction under the Heritage Auctions banner. In that post I call attention to the fact that I had been frustrated by some estates’ unwillingness to assist me in vetting counterfeits. Though that particular post does not pertain to the GMA auction, I believe it is relevant in that it demonstrates my commitment to selling quality wine, my willingness to do the work, and my appreciation that Ponsot and Lafite were leading by example. (Lafite had helped me vet a Jero of their ’59 short months prior to this post). I am pleased to add that we recently received assistance from Chateau Petrus. Also among the most helpful producers has been Domaine des Lambrays – who back in 2004 (I think) replied to one of my inquiries regarding a few ancient bottles with a fax that had hand-drawn sketches of label, capsule and cork details.

I do not claim to be perfect and I do not profess to have never been fooled by a counterfeit bottle in my career. I have rejected millions of dollars in consignments and can relate dozens of anecdotes to support my position. I invite any and all members of the board to email me (FrankM@HA.com) if they would like to discuss the matter. I have elected to pay my bills and feed my family in this industry, and that is something I take very seriously. Nobody wants to see things cleaned up more than I do. I can say with great pride that I have never accepted a consignment from Rudy though he did offer me consignments. To the very best of my knowledge, I have never accepted a consignment from Antonio Castanos or anyone else acting as agent for Rudy, either at Bonhams or Heritage. Antonio had not consigned to Heritage before that GMA auction and has not consigned with us since. This is a fact that I have made abundantly clear to Don before he chose to name us today. Heritage challenged me to hold our house to the strictest standards long before this scandal broke and we have done so with great tenacity. We will defend our conduct and integrity with equal tenacity.

I'm sure everyone appreciates this sort of response -- and it would be nice to receive a similar one from someone at Acker.

[paul hanna]

Lew,

What do you think?

Looks like the start of some positive changes....

[Stuart BeauneHead Niemtzow]

I was at La Paulee in SF a few years ago.
Rudy opened a 3L of 1978 La Tache at an after party. I was there for a quick moment. Everyone seemed to like the wine but I knew it was fake. It was at least off. I talked to a VERY well known Burgundian who took up for Rudy and felt the bottle was ok.
It was obvious that this person really loved Rudy's passion and love for Burgundy. This person has a Burgundy palate that is on the level of Allen's.
I have to tell you it was infectious.
Please don't persecute folks for getting caught up in this with innocent motives. Many didn't seem to be promoting Rudy.
Just my take on this affair.
Those who helped with the deception should be taken to task.
The innocents should be given a chance to salvage. We all make mistakes in judgement. You just hope it isn't fatal.

So, Don, you were the first one to turn Rudy in? Before Burghound was the first?

I don't doubt it was "infectious"....unfortunately, the resulting infection contaminated the wine world.

This is not about persecution. My problem is that people who seem like they might have a responsibility in this because of their positions in the wine world have either been silent or have published self-serving accolades about what they did to help the unraveling. The silence doesn't give anyone reason "to give a chance to salvage". As you say, "those that helped with the deception should be taken to task." To me, that includes everyone "who helped with the deception"-- whether ignorant and unwitting or not-- particuarly those whose mere participation "helped with the deception" and spread the "infection".

Not really sure what your point is, though, frankly. I'm certainly not suggesting that because you kept quiet after you "knew" the '78 was fake that you "helped with the deception", but....why didn't you speak out? Did you tell anyone that you "knew it was fake"? Curious what you did?

Sounds like your "judgment"-- wine wise--was right on. If more people had been as sharp as you.....and...had spoken up....maybe Rudy's "infection" wouldn't have been an epidemic that will have reverberations on the wine re-sale world for generations. Many collectors, fans, etc....have been hurt by the fallout of this. Those who were enablers-- whether innocent, bashful, too polite, indifferent, seduced, etc. etc-- owe some explanations so the rest of us "victims" can understand their perspective, and, if warranted, "give a chance to salvage". Frankly, I haven't heard any such explanations or apologies from anyone of the active participants in Rudy's "largesse"....for their participation-- or even for their inaction.

[WvanGorp]

My guess is there are a lot more Rudy's around than we suspect. Its not as if he, alone, is responsible for all the faked wines.

[Eric LeVine (Online)]

I once had dinner where Robert Parker poured wines from his cellar purchased by a group of eRP members via the Hospice du Rhone. Rudy was there (purchased a seat as a last minute fillin for a UK member who could not attend) and purchased an additional $1000 bottle of 1990 Chave Cuvee Cathelin off the restaurant winelist to share with the table as it fit the theme of a flight very well. I remarked how generous he was. Then I fell asleep. Did I help with the deception?

Rudy cast a pretty long shadow in the wine world in a short amount of time and had a Kevin Baconesque presence in terms of his degrees of separation from a lot of people. At this point choosing to castigate people who came in contact with him at some point (Don for example) serves no purpose other than a witch hunt.

[Chris Blum]

My guess is there are a lot more Rudy's around than we suspect. Its not as if he, alone, is responsible for all the faked wines.

Rudy is just one guy. I would guess there are scores of Rudys doing less marquee counterfeits.

[Bruce Leiserowitz]

I once had dinner where Robert Parker poured wines from his cellar purchased by a group of eRP members via the Hospice du Rhone. Rudy was there (purchased a seat as a last minute fillin for a UK member who could not attend) and purchased an additional $1000 bottle of 1990 Chave Cuvee Cathelin off the restaurant winelist to share with the table as it fit the theme of a flight very well. I remarked how generous he was. Then I fell asleep. Did I help with the deception?

Rudy cast a pretty long shadow in the wine world in a short amount of time and had a Kevin Baconesque presence in terms of his degrees of separation from a lot of people. At this point choosing to castigate people who came in contact with him at some point (Don for example) serves no purpose other than a witch hunt.

I think there is a normal human reaction, in considering this tale, of looking for heroes and villains. As we've already seen, there seems to be room for discussion/argument/disagreement on both sides of that divide.

Just for myself, I would draw some distinctions. First, I think there is a difference between people "in the business" who assisted in sales of fake wines, or who at least may have acted with substantial disregard as to the source of the wine and whether the wine was legitimate. By contrast, there were people who, as you say, simply happened to be at a particular event and said positive things about the wines and/or who supplied them.

Second, I personally draw a distinction between (at latest) pre-Ponsot and post-Ponsot. Before the Ponsot affair, I can understand why some people may have felt that RK was simply a generous collector who may simply have been the innocent buyer of some questionable bottles. After the Ponsot affair, though, I don't quite understand how any reasonable objective and knowledgeable person could react that way. That so many people continued to defend RK up to the time of his arrest still sort of surprises me.

As I've said upthread, there are still a number of shoes that potentially could drop in this entire matter, and it will be interesting to see how it all plays out.

Bruce

[Eric LeVine (Online)]

Well said Bruce.

[todd waldmann]

I once had dinner where Robert Parker poured wines from his cellar purchased by a group of eRP members via the Hospice du Rhone. Rudy was there (purchased a seat as a last minute fillin for a UK member who could not attend) and purchased an additional $1000 bottle of 1990 Chave Cuvee Cathelin off the restaurant winelist to share with the table as it fit the theme of a flight very well. I remarked how generous he was. Then I fell asleep. Did I help with the deception?

Rudy cast a pretty long shadow in the wine world in a short amount of time and had a Kevin Baconesque presence in terms of his degrees of separation from a lot of people. At this point choosing to castigate people who came in contact with him at some point (Don for example) serves no purpose other than a witch hunt.

Clearly, you are implicated Eric. You should be absolutely ashamed. I think the only option is to remove yourself from any affiliation with CellarTracker, effective immediately. I think the obvious question then becomes, "how much responsibility do CellarTracker users bear?" It's time for more answers.

[Cris Whetstone]

I once had dinner where Robert Parker poured wines from his cellar purchased by a group of eRP members via the Hospice du Rhone. Rudy was there (purchased a seat as a last minute fillin for a UK member who could not attend) and purchased an additional $1000 bottle of 1990 Chave Cuvee Cathelin off the restaurant winelist to share with the table as it fit the theme of a flight very well. I remarked how generous he was. Then I fell asleep. Did I help with the deception?

Rudy cast a pretty long shadow in the wine world in a short amount of time and had a Kevin Baconesque presence in terms of his degrees of separation from a lot of people. At this point choosing to castigate people who came in contact with him at some point (Don for example) serves no purpose other than a witch hunt.

Sleeping with Rudy is far more implicating than merely showing up to one of his dinners and extolling the virtues of made up wines.

[Stuart BeauneHead Niemtzow]

I once had dinner where Robert Parker poured wines from his cellar purchased by a group of eRP members via the Hospice du Rhone. Rudy was there (purchased a seat as a last minute fillin for a UK member who could not attend) and purchased an additional $1000 bottle of 1990 Chave Cuvee Cathelin off the restaurant winelist to share with the table as it fit the theme of a flight very well. I remarked how generous he was. Then I fell asleep. Did I help with the deception?

Rudy cast a pretty long shadow in the wine world in a short amount of time and had a Kevin Baconesque presence in terms of his degrees of separation from a lot of people. At this point choosing to castigate people who came in contact with him at some point (Don for example) serves no purpose other than a witch hunt.

Eric, obviously I'm not interested in hearing from people like you-- who weren't vocal acolytes and, frankly, don't sway anyone's views or have any such responsibility. There is a line, of course.

I am not "castigating" anyone, except for their silence/lack of explanation/apology when their roles were obviously crucial in establishing and promoting Rudy's credibility-- since that was the essential element/sine qua non of the scheme. Such people posted on him, his character, tasting ability (he probably knew better than anyone what he was tasting; that's clear now), and his largesse, among other things. Those who posted and allowed their names to be used (and this part wasn't unwitting) don't , I think, get a pass--without hearing from them in some way.

Is Don culpable? Well...certainly more than someone who couldn't stay awake. He says he "knew" the '78 LT was fake. Did he tell anyone then, etc. etc? His silence ..if he really knew..."helped with the deception". Maybe he'll explain his thoughts on whatever he did or didn't do.

But, obviously....the more influence one had in establishing Rudy's credibility, the more explaining, I think, is necessary.

You can call it a witch hunt, Eric. Maybe you felt that the acolytes who performed the same roles with Madoff didn't owe it to anyone to explain their actions, either. Maybe you think they were in the Bacon Brothers' band and, therefore, not part of the deception. But, like with Madoff, it's clear that without followers who were very vocal in his defense...and greedy...Madoff would have gotten nowhere. The same goes for Rudy. Neither acted alone, even if the Elie Wiesels and Kevin Bacons (he and his wife were heavily "invested with Madoff) and Eric LeVines weren't in on the scam, they were doubtlessly part of the plan-- if they served to "infect" others.

While I don't "castigate" the people who leant whatever credibility they had to Rudy's scheme, I don't exonerate either, even if I believe they acted out of ignorance and bad judgment only-- until I hear their candid self-assessments. The 5th amendment doesn't really cover wine...or really work effectively against a valid inquiry. And, frankly, I'd like to understand their perspectives.

While it is none of my business, you...and others here...seem to want to absolve everyone but Rudy for the legacy he's perpetrated. Did you also want to absolve everyone but Madoff, himself? (Serious question; genuine curiousity.) If so, maybe you're nobler than most humans I know.

[Cris Whetstone]

While it is none of my business, you...and others here...seem to want to absolve everyone but Rudy for the legacy he's perpetrated. Did you also want to absolve everyone but Madoff, himself? (Serious question; genuine curiousity.) If so, maybe you're nobler than most humans I know.

While grossly misstating what many here are trying to say you managed to drop a little personally overreach at Eric that is completely uncalled for. How you equate Madoff's actions with someone who didn't interrupt a party by reporting what they thought in their amateur opinion to possibly be a fake wine is beyond me.

[todd waldmann]

Stuart,
Your grasp of logical thinking is truly stupefying & the condescension is insulting to Don & Eric, & frankly, everyone who has contributed positively to this thread. Just stop.

[Chris Blum]

>>Is Don culpable? Well...certainly more than someone who couldn't stay awake. He says he "knew" the '78 LT was fake<<

But at that time, isn't Don thinking that Rudy is a victim of a fake bottle rather than the creator? And frankly, loudly proclaiming a host's bottle a fake in that setting might in retrospect be the right thing, but at the time it might be seen as pretty bleeping rude.

Am I off base?

[Stuart BeauneHead Niemtzow]

Sure, Todd. Whatever you say. What's your view on the subject, instead of me?

[dcornutt]

So, Don, you were the first one to turn Rudy in? Before Burghound was the first?

I don't doubt it was "infectious"....unfortunately, the resulting infection contaminated the wine world.

This is not about persecution. My problem is that people who seem like they might have a responsibility in this because of their positions in the wine world have either been silent or have published self-serving accolades about what they did to help the unraveling. The silence doesn't give anyone reason "to give a chance to salvage". As you say, "those that helped with the deception should be taken to task." To me, that includes everyone "who helped with the deception"-- whether ignorant and unwitting or not-- particuarly those whose mere participation "helped with the deception" and spread the "infection".

Not really sure what your point is, though, frankly. I'm certainly not suggesting that because you kept quiet after you "knew" the '78 was fake that you "helped with the deception", but....why didn't you speak out? Did you tell anyone that you "knew it was fake"? Curious what you did?

Sounds like your "judgment"-- wine wise--was right on. If more people had been as sharp as you.....and...had spoken up....maybe Rudy's "infection" wouldn't have been an epidemic that will have reverberations on the wine re-sale world for generations. Many collectors, fans, etc....have been hurt by the fallout of this. Those who were enablers-- whether innocent, bashful, too polite, indifferent, seduced, etc. etc-- owe some explanations so the rest of us "victims" can understand their perspective, and, if warranted, "give a chance to salvage". Frankly, I haven't heard any such explanations or apologies from anyone of the active participants in Rudy's "largesse"....for their participation-- or even for their inaction.

I understand your point Stuart. I wasn't about to call that wine fake at that party. I would have been thrown out. I did bring up the fact that I didn't think the wine was "correct" to someone I knew. They told me they thought the wine was OK. Rudy played the role of the smooth operator to the max. My point is that it is easy to bring lots of periferal people into this. Lots of people entertained Rudy. He wasn't just with the Angry Men. We are painting with a broad brush here when you group people without motive in with those who were actively involved. That was my only point.

[Stuart BeauneHead Niemtzow]

>>Is Don culpable? Well...certainly more than someone who couldn't stay awake. He says he "knew" the '78 LT was fake<<

But at that time, isn't Don thinking that Rudy is a victim of a fake bottle rather than the creator? And frankly, loudly proclaiming a host's bottle a fake in that setting might in retrospect be the right thing, but at the time it might be seen as pretty bleeping rude.

Am I off base?

Chris...isn't that the point here...Rudy duped people into thinking he was other than he (alledgedly) was: a victim, a super-host, a super taster, etc. He banked on two things, I think: people's innate hesitancy to be "rude" and the power of lavish entertainment and the aura of credibility he skillfully manipulated through those people he lavishly entertained.

Did Don ever speak up if he really knew that bottle was fake (if it really was)? I think Rudy was banking on people falling in line. And, there's no reason thave to "loudly" proclaim anything. Frankly, I doubt Don really "knew" enough at the time to have a basis to do anything. But, I 'm curious about his thinking if he really did "know" it was a fake bottle.

And, Don, I don't lump everyone together, at all. Some had much more responsibility to others than you did. I am just curious what went through your mind...and what you did about it in between that night and today's post. I don't suggest you are culpable of anything..nor was anyone else necessarily.

[dcornutt]

Is Don culpable? Well...certainly more than someone who couldn't stay awake. He says he "knew" the '78 LT was fake. Did he tell anyone then, etc. etc? His silence ..if he really knew..."helped with the deception". Maybe he'll explain his thoughts on whatever he did or didn't do.

Sneaking in the backdoor of a party at Mina and grabbing a small taste of 78 La Tache is not really being in bed. I said something to a few friends about it not being right. Also one Burgundian as I said. Making accusations is not my M.O. Rudy just seemed like a really rich guy who got a bum 3L bottle that probably was worth about $70k at the time. Without some pretty obvious evidence, it is not a good idea to accuse someone of perpetrating a fraud.

[Tim McCracken]

Chris...isn't that the point here...Rudy duped people into thinking he was other than he (alledgedly) was: a victim, a super-host, a super taster, etc. He banked on two things, I think: people's innate hesitancy to be "rude" and the power of lavish entertainment and the aura of credibility he skillfully manipulated through those people he lavishly entertained.

Most people assume the best about other people. I hang out with a bunch of wine folks on occasion, and I assume that they are indeed genuine wine-lovers without ulterior motives. I never met Rudy, but I'd bet that if I had, I would have assumed that he was a generous and gifted wine lover. If someone opens a wine and I think it is a fake, I feel bad for the person that brought the wine, because I presume that they spent a lot of money and got duped themselves.

I don't blame anyone for presuming the best about Rudy, at least pre-2008.

[todd waldmann]

Sure, Todd. Whatever you say. What's your view on the subject, instead of me?

I have expressed my view, but will gladly restate it. I think it is unduly harsh to look back with the benefit of hindsight (which, even at this point has made available only a small fraction of the facts), & make accusations about those who were peripherally associated w/ Rudy & imply that certain people are somehow culpable. Maybe you invariably assume the worst about people & think it appropriate to attempt to call someone out at the slightest hint of impropriety. Not every one does. Just because someone doesn't respond that way does not equate to actively condoning an illegal activity, especially when one has no definitive evidence of such activity. I suspect that WHEN ALL THE FACTS ARE AVAILABLE it will become apparent that there are some who could (should?) have been more proactive. Prior to the availability of those facts, it is mere speculation. Ongoing speculation that could very well be unfairly damaging to peoples' reputations & possibly even livelihoods. I would advocate for more circumspect discussion regarding others' involvement until the facts are known.

[Stuart BeauneHead Niemtzow]

Nor do I, Tim. Frankly, for me, that Allen Meadows seemed to be so involved and such a fan of the guy and his wines was enough for me in those years. Beyond that I really didn't care or suspect anything. I found it offensive the way Rudy and his entertainees conspicuously consumed. But, I now realize that that conspicuousness was all part of the grand plan...as well as the "assumption" about the "best about other people".

I find Rudy's scheme itself, and his chess pieces, to be the most..and maybe only...interesting thing about the whole subject. And, as with Madoff and other frauds where people were not only duped but took the contagion to the next victims, I find it most of all interesting to think about where that "line" gets drawn between innocent victim and duped perpetrator. Assuming that there is no knowledge involved, I think the line hinges on what their roles were...and how much potential credibility they add to any fraud...Obviously, some have a whole lot more to add than others...with a potential concomitant responsibility.

Do people here/in this discussion think that everyone but Rudy deserves a pass? If not...where does the line get drawn....and who are on the wrong side of the line. I think that is a very interesting...and debatable topic here, as it was in the Madoff mess. To my knowledge, Paul Wasserman is the only person who seems to recognize what side of the line he fell on...and who has apologized. If there are others, I'm all ears.

After 2008, there are no excuses. That's obvious. But, the game was up by then...and those who praised and defended Rudy before that have, for the most part, been silent since.

[Stuart BeauneHead Niemtzow]

Sure, Todd. Whatever you say. What's your view on the subject, instead of me?

I have expressed my view, but will gladly restate it. I think it is unduly harsh to look back with the benefit of hindsight (which, even at this point has made available only a small fraction of the facts), & make accusations about those who were peripherally associated w/ Rudy & imply that certain people are somehow culpable. Maybe you invariably assume the worst about people & think it appropriate to attempt to call someone out at the slightest hint of impropriety. Not every one does. Just because someone doesn't respond that way does not equate to actively condoning an illegal activity, especially when one has no definitive evidence of such activity. I suspect that WHEN ALL THE FACTS ARE AVAILABLE it will become apparent that there are some who could (should?) have been more proactive. Prior to the availability of those facts, it is mere speculation. Ongoing speculation that could very well be unfairly damaging to peoples' reputations & possibly even livelihoods. I would advocate for more circumspect discussion regarding others' involvement until the facts are known.

Well, Todd...then such a discussion would likely have to wait for decades.."When all the facts are available" is a great concept for a time to start a discussion, but....a meaningless concept in reality. Godot might arrive before that! This is discussion, not speculation, based on what IS known now....and what was ostensibly happening between 10 and 4 years ago. I think the facts are plenty ripe now to discuss what "culpability" means in the context of a large scale fraud...unless the only criterion is actual knowledge of the fraud itself. In that case, maybe everyone deserves a pass but Rudy?

I have no horse in this race, per se. I've never bought a bottle of wine at auction...nor have I sold any. I don't collect trophy wines per se, as I've bought newly released vintages, accross the board, at all levels from bourgogne to grand cru. I've never owned a bottle of DRC or Ponsot, and have no interest in owning them. And, I certainly never encountered Rudy or his wines. I just find the issues to consider very interesting. Clearly, people enabled Rudy's scheme. Does that make them culpable? Apparently no one here thinks so. Or, wants to wait until the definitive "report" is finished before considering the questions. But, "all the facts are NEVER available" and it's not just "facts" that inform such discussions, IMO. I'm talking about some much less concrete concepts.

[Brian G r a f s t r o m]

And, Don, I don't lump everyone together, at all. ...

I think you should go read what you wrote more carefully, Stuart.

Personally, I think there's a big difference between (1) those who knowingly assisted Rudy in his scheme, (2) those who acted with disregard for the truth, (3) wine critic professionals who were duped by Rudy (presumably unwittingly), and (4) amateurs who were duped (unbeknownst to them) by Rudy.

I, too, would like to see some mea culpas from those who previously defended Rudy and, even moreso, also from those who castigated those who voiced questions about Rudy and his actions. However, that is a mostly different matter, in my mind, from the matter of who is and isn't culpable in this big scheme. Some people are good liars, some are masters. Rudy was a master. IMO, the mere fact that one believed Rudy's lies should not brand them as being a guilty party in this scheme.

[jcoley3]

Stuart,

I would also note that, rightly or wrongly, whistle-blowing rarely works out well for the whistle-blower, either at the time or down the road. I don't know what Don tasted or saw wrong with Rudy's double magnum, but I doubt he saw himself as sufficiently expert in the matter to start making calls to the Domaine and crying foul. It's not like Don Cornutt had the same opportunity Don Cornwell had to comb through an auction catalog and find all the miniscule flaws and issues that made the recently issued bottles suspect and allowed him to feel he could definitively proclaim a wine faked, particularly with another palate he trusted telling him the wine was fine. Even if Don Cornutt was privately convinced he was right, what was he to do?

I've been in Don's shoes, sort of, with a bad bottle of Ch. Margaux at a dinner party - it was from the early 70s when things were going very wrong at Margaux, and the bottle was clearly oxidized. A couple of other guests were waxing poetic about the magic of Margaux's terroir. The wine was dead, but why show up the other guests? I was sure of what I was tasting, but why get into the battle of palate egos such a statement would have produced?

As another example, there was a guy I knew in a tasting group whose guesses were occasionally just a little too uncanny. I could never prove that he was using a bit of slight-of-hand to look good, but there was a time where he called a wine's grape blend, vintage and region dead on from a wine that was so brutally marred by brett that I simply could not believe he guessed the wine by anything he tasted. I was sure he marked the bottle or the bag somehow, but in putting on my detective hat, what would I have really accomplished by pursuing my suspicions? At best, I would have outed a guy for cheating at blind tasting, and at worst I would have created a mini-martyr if I couldn't prove what I suspected.

While I agree we can certainly discuss this without all facts being available, there are many facts we don't have that are relevant - most importantly - how extensive was Rudy's fakery? There are some people in this thread who seem to think that he did nothing but churn out fakes from day one (some of which seems fueled by considerable schadenfreude). Others seem to think there were a fair number of real wines blended in with fakes - if I had to speculate, I would say this was the case, with more and more fake wine being pumped into the pipeline as time passed. Once Rudy established himself as a "great guy" with "genuinely" great wines (again, I suspect he had to provide the real deal regularly to generate his initial bona fides), it would become easier as time passed to insert more and more fakes into his auction lots. More and more people would be invested in believing the wines were real and that Rudy was real, too.

I have tasted at least three wines that I know of that passed through Rudi's cellar. Two of them I mentioned earlier - 42 Clos des Lambrays and 43 Clos de Tart. The latter was of Grand Cru quality. If I was fooled by it, chapeau to Rudy. It tasted like other Burgundy of comparable age and quality I've encountered from more impeccable sources. The third was a 47 Faiveley NSG Porrets St. Georges, and if Rudy was faking this kind of stuff, then the auction world as we know it will be over soon. My note for it is somewhere over on EBob. There may have been other Rudy bottles I came across - those are the three I know of for certain, though I never met the man, myself.

Suppose Don had "confronted" Rudy over the fake at the time. All Rudy would have done is passed himself off as the victim of someone else's scheme. He was buying in such volume that he was bound to have acquired fakes. If you look back at the articles in this thread, his whole acquisition spree is one of the ways he acquired even MORE credibility in the community - by claiming to have been the victim of auction fakes and positioning himself as an amateur expert. Don calling the wine out may have only served to enable him. It took a gross overstep on Rudy's part to blow himself up. One the Ponsot fakery became public, it seems people could bring their suspicions forward with less noise from some of his "enablers" in the auction community.

So here's my question(s) - who exactly do you want to come forward and take responsbility? Allen? Rob Rosania? Others of the 12 Angry Men? John Kapon? I can't recall who else served to tout Rudy on the other board that seems to have fueled the grudges held here. Who knows if they are in a legal position to comment at length? Based on the federal complaint, I doubt we'll hear from John Kapon on this topic for a while.

What would you have done in Don's shoes about the La Tache? Should you be taken to task for not pursuing your suspicions about Rudy and his bacchanalias past simply expressing them on a wine board? The latter question is somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but then again, where is the line?

[Glenn Gallup]

I had a long career in management and it taught me a lot of stuff. One of the things it taught me was if you wait till you have all the facts to make a decision you are too late. You will always find that you "need some more information". It's a way to avoid acting.

[Stuart BeauneHead Niemtzow]

So here's my question(s) - who exactly do you want to come forward and take responsbility? Allen? Rob Rosania? Others of the 12 Angry Men? John Kapon? I can't recall who else served to tout Rudy on the other board that seems to have fueled the grudges held here. Who knows if they are in a legal position to comment at length? Based on the federal complaint, I doubt we'll hear from John Kapon on this topic for a while.

What would you have done in Don's shoes about the La Tache? Should you be taken to task for not pursuing your suspicions about Rudy and his bacchanalias past simply expressing them on a wine board? The latter question is somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but then again, where is the line?

Good questions, Jim. And, I now realize that I seem to be suggesting that Don is a "culpable" party. Frankly, I don't believe that he really "knew" the bottle was fake (despite his claim) and , therefore, I don't believe him culpable of anything. My comments are more about skepticism that Don really "knew" anything than about his inaction. I need to clarify that. If he really did "know", maybe he should have thought about what to do. I agree that rebuking Rudy or causing a scene would have been pointless. But, if convinced that it was fake, I think he should have tried to do something, rather than post it on a wineboard 5 years after the fact. Maybe he could have done the same thing Allen Meadows claims to have done: initiated the unraveling of the scheme.

What would I have done? Assuming that I had the capability to really "know" it was fake (maybe it was that obvious, who knows), I hope I would have discreetly mentioned it to others to see if they agreed. I certainly wouldn't have made a scene then and there. But, in reality, I'd probably have been so seduced by the generosity and the idea of tasting a legendary wine, that I would have doubted my opinion, and have done nothing either. I don't think Don or anyone really "knew" things were fake, though. I suspect that hindsight has made many people "know" things about the integrity of the wines they didn't really "know" at the time. Sort of another way of rationalizing being part of those duped..in any fraud. Human nature.

What would I like to see, and from whom. Good question. I guess I'd like to hear the perspectives of all of those who accepted his lavish "hospitality" and touted his wines, palate, etc. at the time...and even vouched for the guy. I like to understand why they don't think they need to apologize, as they communicated Rudy's "conspicuous" consumption by posting on it...and...if Allen wrote about those events in Burghound...by writing about it. This all gave Rudy all the credibility he needed to do his thing.

I don't even know who the "12 angry men" are...or what that group is. I've only heard the term recently..other than as the Henry Fonda movie about the jury in a murder case. But, I do remember others' names who posted laudatory things about Rudy and his integrity/decency, etc. at the time. And, they did so in ways that weren't very nice to those who were skeptical about what this guy was really about.

RE: Allen Meadows. I feel bad for him; he and I communicated about Burgundy and other things well before he began his publication. I think he is a genuine, decent guy who tries to maintain a high level of integrity. But, he messed up on this one. As I've said above, because he vouched for Rudy was the only reason I thought maybe Rudy was, in fact, the real deal. Unfortunately, because Allen posted about Rudy and the events he conspicuously hosted (and maybe used Rudy and those events to further the value of his publication; I just don't remember....and stopped subscribing around 2007, I think) and seemingly allowed Kapon to flaunt his name to give credibility to Rudy and to Kapon's auctions, I think Allen was, unfortunately, at the center of the storm. I think it was Allen who , more than anyone else, gave Rudy the credibility to perpetrate whatever he perpetrated. I think his vouching for Rudy and his wines and events were a key to Rudy's pulling it off. Though I have no reason, even at this point, to suspect that Allen was in on things, I do think Allen's own perspective about his role..or lack of role...other than to turn Rudy in ...is a good example of "denial"..a serious example, in fact. So, I'd like to hear his perspective on his role...and not just his thoughts on what a critic should or shouldn't do..or his self-laudatory stories about how he finally came to suspect Rudy with the Ponsot stuff. Maybe it's naive to think that Allen could do that...legally or constitutionally. But, I don't think his crucial role in Rudy's carefully orchestrated scheme can't be underestimated. No one who I think was involved had anywhere near the degree of respectability or credibility to transfer some of theirs to Rudy, except Allen.

Again, though it sounds like I have decided who is "culpable" or deserves "castigating", I haven't. But, I think from what we do know, some people need to explain themselves in a believable manner to avoid deserving that treatment. And, I don't think , other than from Paul Wasserman we've heard from any of them. Maybe we'll have to wait for the book...or the movie.

And, at this point...years after the fact..I think we know enough about Rudy's events/behavior with his invitees...to discuss things. Though we know little about whether Rudy was acting alone...and maybe the fact that he seems to be pleading to something means that there are others...we do know enough about the behavior and actions of those who benefited from Rudy's purported largesse to evaluate things now. And, as I said above, to me, this is the most interesting part of the whole saga...by far. Just like the Madoff mess. The spread of the infection was the most interesting part, IMO.

Maybe, though, this is all too deep to explore on a wineboard, though...it's the only place I'd ever be able to find anyone to discuss this with.

[Eric LeVine (Online)]

While it is none of my business, you...and others here...seem to want to absolve everyone but Rudy for the legacy he's perpetrated. Did you also want to absolve everyone but Madoff, himself? (Serious question; genuine curiousity.) If so, maybe you're nobler than most humans I know.

While grossly misstating what many here are trying to say you managed to drop a little personally overreach at Eric that is completely uncalled for. How you equate Madoff's actions with someone who didn't interrupt a party by reporting what they thought in their amateur opinion to possibly be a fake wine is beyond me.

In this case, I don't think it is an overreach and actually is more similar than one might think. We did try to get close and friends and family members to invest with Madoff. Thankfully none did.

Still, there is a long distance between perpetrator and innocent sucker.

[WvanGorp]

To me, the only real "problem" with Allen Meadows is the description by Kapon extolling Meadows' endorsement of Rudy's wines. The over the top comments endorsing Rudy's wines, as described by Kapon, creates an issue.

Did Allen swoon and publish reviews on Rudy's wines that later turned out to be fake? If so, that is potentially a problem. If Allen didn't detect them as fake, that could call into question his tasting prowess. John Kapon goes out of his way to state that Meadows swooned over the wines. If untrue, it would be helpful for Allen to so state; if true, well....that may be an issue in some way. I mean--if a reviewer goes crazy over a set of wines that turns out to be fake, but publishes the reviews as if the wines are the real deal, then that is a problem it seems to me. Especially if the reviewer (such as Allen has done) states that the best way to detect a fake is to taste the wine (a premise, by the way, to which I do not subscribe). (Too many people have been fooled using this method, including most probably Robert Parker and Michael Broadbent.)

[David Glasser]

Good question, Wilfred. I don't think we can hold Allen responsible for what others said he said about the wines. I would like to know what Allen himself said and wrote about these wines. Here's another snippet from a May, 2008 thread on eRP, discussing the April, 2008 tasting in which Allen was served a fake Ponsot not long before the AMC auction on April 25, 2008, from which the fake Ponsot lots were withdrawn:



Originally Posted by Robert Thornton
Hi Allen,
I believe you tasted a fake '59 Ponsot Clos St. Denis from the lot in question at the "big boy" dinner in Los Angeles last month. What'd you think of it?

Best,
-Robert


Hi Robert,

I thought that it was probably from 1959 and that it was from one of the more elegant grand crus though as with any blind tasting, the best you can do is try and tease out vintage and appellation. Whether it was any of these things I obviously can't say beyond observing that there wasn't anything about the wine that made me think that it wasn't from '59 and that it wasn't of grand cru quality. I might add that the bottle was served blind and our comments were made before the wine was identified.

Whatever the wine actually was, I believe it to have been something of relatively high quality. To try and give you a bit of context, this wine was tasted along side a '59 Roumier Bonnes Mares and more or less held its own so I'm confident that whatever it really was, it was no slouch.

When it was revealed as a Ponsot '59 CSD Vieilles Vignes, I was frankly somewhat dubious but I really wasn't sure why. I knew that I had not had any Ponsot CSD's anywhere near this age (1985 is the oldest that I have personally tasted) and while I knew that Ponsot had first used the Vieilles Vignes indicator in 1959 for the Clos de la Roche, something just didn't seem quite right. I didn't know when the first vintage of CSD was and I got to wondering why it might be that I had never had an older Ponsot CSD as I've had quite a bit of the Clos de la Roche. There of course could have been valid reasons for this, it just seemed probable that I would have run into older examples at one time or another.

By coincidence, I got to talking about this very question with my good friend Doug Barzelay who had exactly the same reaction about the CSD when he saw Rob's post about the dinner. He didn't know when the first CSD vintage was either and we decided to contact Laurent Ponsot and dig a bit deeper. So he wrote to Ponsot and as has now been explained, Ponsot wrote us back stating what we already half suspected, which is that the '59 CSD couldn't exist. And ironically enough, it was the ensuing discussion with Ponsot that got him involved in the first place.

Best to you,

Allen
Burghound.com


This all happened in a pretty short time frame. Though John Kapon may have extolled the wine and represented Allen as having been enamored of it, I doubt that Allen himself published laudatory notes about it in his newsletter. Were there any instances of Allen extolling the quality of Rudy's wines? Not Rudy's generosity or the excellence of non-Rudy wines served at dinners where Rudy was present, but wines sourced from Rudy? If there were, is there any evidence that those bottles were fakes? If not, then all the questions about Allen's role amount to total speculation, and any attempt to blame him for facilitating Rudy's scheme is unsubstantiated guilt by association.

[Don Cornwell]

Throughout my career I have maintained a commitment to honest business and there are many who can bear witness to that fact, including Maureen Downey and Don Cornwell, but let me first shoot the elephant in the room and state that Antonio Castanos did have a consignment in last year’s June auction # 5084 which Heritage executed on behalf of Greg Martin Auctions. Let me also be clear that Heritage did not solicit or contract that consignment, nor did we have the opportunity to inspect the wine prior to producing the catalog.
* * * *
The consignment spanning between lots 274-314 belonged to Antonio Castanos. There were just 8 bottles in total that fit the pattern of suspicious wines which have been described repeatedly in this thread. * * * *

There is a ton of additional evidence that we vetted that Greg Martin auction very carefully and I remain 100% convinced that our conduct is beyond reproach. I would prefer to say that I never auctioned wines consigned by Antonio Castanos, but I can say that we were placed in a difficult position and we did our absolute best to navigate it with the highest ethical standards.* * * *

I can say with great pride that I have never accepted a consignment from Rudy though he did offer me consignments. To the very best of my knowledge, I have never accepted a consignment from Antonio Castanos or anyone else acting as agent for Rudy, either at Bonhams or Heritage. Antonio had not consigned to Heritage before that GMA auction and has not consigned with us since. This is a fact that I have made abundantly clear to Don before he chose to name us today. Heritage challenged me to hold our house to the strictest standards long before this scandal broke and we have done so with great tenacity. We will defend our conduct and integrity with equal tenacity.

Let me clarify my concerns on several points. First, I previously listed all of the auction houses that I know of that received wines that originated from Rudy over the past several years, either directly or through Antonio Castanos or others acting as agents, and I did so without respect to fault. In my view, the public is 100% entitled to that information. People who bought wine that originated from Rudy should know where it came from and ought to have the option to pursue refunds etc from the auction houses should they wish.

My issue with Greg Martin Wine Auctions and Heritage Wine Auctions on their joint June 2011 sale is not with the vetting process per se -- although I have some serious questions regarding the vetting process that allowed the 66 Romanee Conti that was one of the featured wines of the auction to be sold (see below.) I have no doubt that Heritage, inheriting a “joint auction” that someone else put together at the 11th hour, took pains to scrutinize the wines before the sale. But that is not, and never has been the issue.

My fundamental problem with this auction is that the people in charge of the sale -- including Mario Sculatti, the President of Greg Martin Wine Auctions (and previously a Spectrum Wine Auctions employee for nearly two years), knew that Antonio Castanos sold wines at auction on behalf of Rudy Kurniawan and they elected to sell the wines anyway without disclosing that the wines came from Rudy Kurniawan and without disclosing to buyers Mr. Kurniawan’s well-established history of association with counterfeit bottles offered by him for sale at auction. In my opinion, when an auction house allows wines to be sold which they know or have reason to believe came from Rudy Kurniawan, and they fail to disclose that Mr. Kurniawan was the source and his history, that is fraudulent conduct.

As the pre-auction press release by Greg Martin Auctions makes clear, the President of Greg Martin Wine Auctions was Mario Sculatti. http://www.prweb.com/releases/2011/04/prweb5277264.htm Mario Sculatti, prior to joining Greg Martin wine auctions, worked for Spectrum Wine Auctions. According to Antonio Castanos, Mario Sculatti was his primary contact at Spectrum since November 2009. According to Mr. Castanos, Mario Sculatti was well aware that the wines that Castanos consigned to auction came from Rudy Kurniawan (as were the other employees at Spectrum according to Mr. Castanos).

Heritage completed the purchase of Greg Martin Wine Auctions after the June 2011 joint auction sale was completed. Mr. Sculatti was not offered a position with Heritage. (Kudos to Frank for that). As I’ve mentioned before, Mr. Castanos consigned Rudy Kurniawan wines through Zachys through May of 2011. At or about that point, Zachys refused to accept any more consignments from Castanos, apparently because of his connection with Mr. Kurniawan. Not to be outdone, according to Mr. Castanos, he got his friend Mario Sculatti to consign additional wines for Rudy Kurniawan to Zachys under Mario Sculatti’s name. I do not yet know which Zachys auctions were involved and which wines Mr. Sculatti consigned.

Of further concern given all of the circumstances is an entry from a Yahoo Groups November 2010 posting by Mr. Sculatti that someone forwarded to me yesterday. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bottlecol ... ssage/6019 Mr. Sculatti wrote an email to a website which offers to professionally clean antique bottles as follows:

From: Mario Sculatti <msculatti@...>
To: "goodolebottles@..." <goodolebottles@...>
Sent: Wed, November 17, 2010 1:14:21 AM
Subject: Seal/date wine bottles

Hello there,

I am a collector in California and I am looking to purchase seal/date wine bottles. I wanted to contact your club to see if you can introduce me to any major collectors of seal bottles (wine or olive oils) who might want to sell.

I am buying big right now, really growing my collection, mostly focused on acquiring French and US sealed /dated wine bottles.

Please advise you can introduce me to sellers.

All the best,

Mario Sculatti
1223 Main Street
Saint Helena, CA 94754
707.235.2555
[UPDATE: This turns out to be a legitimate hobby of Mr. Sculatti. See Post 2572 below]

As for my friend Frank Martell, he has chosen his words about Mr. Castanos quite carefully. While I'm sure that Antonio Castanos didn't volunteer to Frank that the wines were from Rudy Kurniawan, that's not the end of the story. As Frank and I have discussed previously, Frank was well aware of the rumors/accusations in the wine industry that Antonio Castanos was acting as Rudy’s broker in selling wines. Frank admittedly knew enough about Antonio Castanos and his alleged relationship with Rudy Kurniawan to be highly suspicious (as he even suggests in his post.) Given that, at an absolute minimum, Frank should have been asking a whole lot of point blank questions about the source of this consignment and its provenance – both to Mario Sculatti and to Antonio Castanos. According to Mr. Castanos, he’s always been up front in answering direct questions about whether Rudy was the source of his wines.

The bottom line is this: No matter how you slice this, the wines should never have been accepted in the first place by Greg Martin Wine Auctions and they should have been pulled from the auction by Heritage Wine Auctions. If Heritage and Greg Martin wanted to proceed with the sale of those lots anyway, then they had an absolute obligation to disclose that the wines were consigned by Antonio Castanos on behalf of Rudy Kurniawan and to disclose Mr. Kurniawan’s known history of association with counterfeit bottles in wines he had previously consigned to auction.

In my view, no amount of vetting of the wines can possibly substitute for, or forgive, the failure to disclose to the public that the wines are sourced from Rudy Kurniawan. Making the judgment call that certain wines in a consignment from Mr. Kurniawan aren’t likely to be fake because of their lesser label status, and then deciding that this somehow justifies selling those bottles without disclosing that Mr. Kurniawan is the source cannot be rationalized or excused.

Finally, let me say that for an auction house to declare that it can separate the legitimate from the counterfeit among a consignment they know is from a suspected counterfeiter is in my view arrogance in the extreme. That is certainly the view that Christies has taken with respect to their sales of wines directly consigned by Rudy Kurniawan in 2009 and 2010. Yet, if you look at the photographs of lots 296 (62 Romanée Conti) and 297 (59 Romanée Conti) in the first Christies auction on September 12, 2009 in NY – the one we tried to stop – and simply look for the Aigu defects, you’ll see that Christie’s missed the boat completely.

The view that “we can ferret out the fakes from among a Kurniwan consignment” also appears to be Heritage’s explanation for proceeding with sale of the Castanos lots. That is sheer folly. Let me cite but one example from the Martin/Heritage June 2011 auction to make my point – the 1966 Romanée Conti – which by the way was NOT consigned by Antonio Castanos.

You will find a very detailed high resolution photo of this case here. http://ww1.prweb.com/prfiles/2011/04/27/1129594/RomaneeContifull.jpg You can click on the photo to enlarge it significantly.

Yes, this wine has the usual Aigu problems. Propriétaire on the second line of the main label has the Aigu and should not in the 1966 vintage. Romanée Conti on the AOC green line is missing its Aigu. But you didn’t need to have this knowledge to realize that these wines are counterfeit. Look carefully at the photograph. The first thing you should notice is that the capsules are different colors – some are a bright cherry red and some are a somewhat darker red-violet color and the two on the far right appear to be violet. Those same two bottles on the far right have the domaine information on the capsule cut off (like a lot of others we’ve seen from Rudy of late). You should also notice that the bottles on the far right are shorter than the others and that the glass appears to be a bit darker (although the latter point is a matter of judgment from a photograph). The shorter bottles and different colored capsules cannot be explained in what is purported to be a pristine OWC case with consecutive bottle numbers.

Notice also that the neck labels are all as white as snow and yet the main labels all look “seasoned” or slightly oxidized. Now look at the strip labels on the bottom. These are the same purported Italian strip labels from Gaja which were on the case of 62 Romanée Conti sold by Acker Merrall in Hong Kong in December 2011 – as discussed earlier in this thread -- which are known to have originated from Rudy Kurniawan via Antonio Castanos. Those strip labels were printed on a Laser printer and have proportional fonts and full justification -- on 43 year old bottles! Finally, although this is a matter of judgment, in my opinion, the wood case looks way too new and unoxidized for a 43-year old wine box and the numbering on the burned in vintage date looks a bit dodgy as well.

Since the 66 Romanée Conti was one of the three featured lots of the auction and it was supposedly given extreme scrutiny before being sold, I am left with extreme doubts about the ability of any of the Heritage personnel to detect what should be obvious discrepancies in the vetting process.

[Stuart BeauneHead Niemtzow]

Good question, Wilfred. I don't think we can hold Allen responsible for what others said he said about the wines. I would like to know what Allen himself said and wrote about these wines. Here's another snippet from a May, 2008 thread on eRP, discussing the April, 2008 tasting in which Allen was served a fake Ponsot not long before the AMC auction on April 25, 2008, from which the fake Ponsot lots were withdrawn:


This all happened in a pretty short time frame. Though John Kapon may have extolled the wine and represented Allen as having been enamored of it, I doubt that Allen himself published laudatory notes about it in his newsletter. Were there any instances of Allen extolling the quality of Rudy's wines? Not Rudy's generosity or the excellence of non-Rudy wines served at dinners where Rudy was present, but wines sourced from Rudy? If there were, is there any evidence that those bottles were fakes? If not, then all the questions about Allen's role amount to total speculation, and any attempt to blame him for facilitating Rudy's scheme is unsubstantiated guilt by association.

David...we see things very differently, I guess. For me, there is no "blame" in not recognizing fake wines by tasting, etc. It obviously takes super powers that none of us have. (And, Rudy knew that...just as Madoff knew of people's intrinsic greed despite the logic of returns that were impossible). This whole thing isn't really about some wealthy trophy hunters being wrong about their prey....or looking silly in the hunt. That's why people who "knew" things were fake are, IMO, maybe a little culpable.

But, some culpability, IMO, arguably belongs to those who allowed their own credibility to be used to create/bolster Rudy's total lack of credibility. I presume that Allen allowed Kapon to use his thoughts. Allen posted his own. Did he write in his publication? Does anyone know? (I don't.) That bottles were fake...and who might have recognized it...are the much less interesting aspect of this whole saga...just like the Madoff one. Who inadvertently..or on purpose...facilitiated it perpetration by apparently vouching for the perpetrators..is, for me, the only really interesting aspect of this...and most such frauds. And, I think, also, that all the testimonials by Allen (I think) and many others about Rudy's generosity, genuine nature, etc. etc. were much more vital to Rudy's success. (And, that's what I wrote about in those years: as someone posted earlier on this thread, I told those people that they knew nothing about Rudy himself, depsite what they thought they knew from their encounters and his largesse, and that they were seduced by it all..included what I thought was grotesquely "conspicuous consumption" that would make Thorsten Veblen's eyes open wide. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conspicuous_consumption * Those people were not kind in their responses. They said I, and others, drove dear Rudy from posting...and that it was our/the world's loss. And, as I've said, it was only Allen's involvement that made me hesitate to be even more blunt then. (I don't really remember what he wrote, but he did; it's there on Squires...and, maybe, in his publication.)

Do you give everyone but Rudy a pass, David?

* I realize that this is over the top, but I was just re-reading a bit of Veblen's 1899 treatise...which I hadn't seen in 40+ years. It sounds familiar, though.

Conspicuous consumption of valuable goods is a means of reputability to the gentleman of leisure….. The aid of friends and competitors is therefore brought in by resorting to the giving of valuable presents and expensive feasts and entertainments. Presents and feasts had probably another origin than that of naive ostentation, but they required their utility for this purpose very early, and they have retained that character to the present; so that their utility in this respect has now long been the substantial ground on which these usages rest. Costly entertainments, such as the potlatch or the ball, are peculiarly adapted to serve this end. The competitor with whom the entertainer wishes to institute a comparison is, by this method, made to serve as a means to the end. He consumes vicariously for his host at the same time that he is witness to the consumption of that excess of good things which his host is unable to dispose of single-handed, and he is also made to witness his host's facility in etiquette.
[T]he impecunious, or marginal, gentlemen of leisure, affiliate themselves by a system of dependence or fealty to the great ones; by so doing they gain an increment of repute, or of the means with which to lead a life of leisure, from their patron.
Throughout this graduated scheme of vicarious leisure and vicarious consumption the rule holds that these offices must be performed in some such manner, or under some such circumstance or insignia, as shall point plainly to the master to whom this leisure or consumption pertains, and to whom therefore the resulting increment of good repute of right inures. The consumption and leisure executed by these persons for their master or patron represents an investment on his part with a view to an increase of good fame.

[Dan Collins]

Throughout my career I have maintained a commitment to honest business and there are many who can bear witness to that fact, including Maureen Downey and Don Cornwell, but let me first shoot the elephant in the room and state that Antonio Castanos did have a consignment in last year’s June auction # 5084 which Heritage executed on behalf of Greg Martin Auctions. Let me also be clear that Heritage did not solicit or contract that consignment, nor did we have the opportunity to inspect the wine prior to producing the catalog.
* * * *
The consignment spanning between lots 274-314 belonged to Antonio Castanos. There were just 8 bottles in total that fit the pattern of suspicious wines which have been described repeatedly in this thread. * * * *

There is a ton of additional evidence that we vetted that Greg Martin auction very carefully and I remain 100% convinced that our conduct is beyond reproach. I would prefer to say that I never auctioned wines consigned by Antonio Castanos, but I can say that we were placed in a difficult position and we did our absolute best to navigate it with the highest ethical standards.* * * *

I can say with great pride that I have never accepted a consignment from Rudy though he did offer me consignments. To the very best of my knowledge, I have never accepted a consignment from Antonio Castanos or anyone else acting as agent for Rudy, either at Bonhams or Heritage. Antonio had not consigned to Heritage before that GMA auction and has not consigned with us since. This is a fact that I have made abundantly clear to Don before he chose to name us today. Heritage challenged me to hold our house to the strictest standards long before this scandal broke and we have done so with great tenacity. We will defend our conduct and integrity with equal tenacity.

Let me clarify my concerns on several points. First, I previously listed all of the auction houses that I know of that received wines that originated from Rudy over the past several years, either directly or through Antonio Castanos or others acting as agents, and I did so without respect to fault. In my view, the public is 100% entitled to that information. People who bought wine that originated from Rudy should know where it came from and ought to have the option to pursue refunds etc from the auction houses should they wish.

My issue with Greg Martin Wine Auctions and Heritage Wine Auctions on their joint June 2011 sale is not with the vetting process per se -- although I have some serious questions regarding the vetting process that allowed the 66 Romanee Conti that was one of the featured wines of the auction to be sold (see below.) I have no doubt that Heritage, inheriting a “joint auction” that someone else put together at the 11th hour, took pains to scrutinize the wines before the sale. But that is not, and never has been the issue.

My fundamental problem with this auction is that the people in charge of the sale -- including Mario Sculatti, the President of Greg Martin Wine Auctions (and previously a Spectrum Wine Auctions employee for nearly two years), knew that Antonio Castanos sold wines at auction on behalf of Rudy Kurniawan and they elected to sell the wines anyway without disclosing that the wines came from Rudy Kurniawan and without disclosing to buyers Mr. Kurniawan’s well-established history of association with counterfeit bottles offered by him for sale at auction. In my opinion, when an auction house allows wines to be sold which they know or have reason to believe came from Rudy Kurniawan, and they fail to disclose that Mr. Kurniawan was the source and his history, that is fraudulent conduct.

As the pre-auction press release by Greg Martin Auctions makes clear, the President of Greg Martin Wine Auctions was Mario Sculatti. http://www.prweb.com/releases/2011/04/prweb5277264.htm Mario Sculatti, prior to joining Greg Martin wine auctions, worked for Spectrum Wine Auctions. According to Antonio Castanos, Mario Sculatti was his primary contact at Spectrum since November 2009. According to Mr. Castanos, Mario Sculatti was well aware that the wines that Castanos consigned to auction came from Rudy Kurniawan (as were the other employees at Spectrum according to Mr. Castanos).

Heritage completed the purchase of Greg Martin Wine Auctions after the June 2011 joint auction sale was completed. Mr. Sculatti was not offered a position with Heritage. (Kudos to Frank for that). As I’ve mentioned before, Mr. Castanos consigned Rudy Kurniawan wines through Zachys through May of 2011. At or about that point, Zachys refused to accept any more consignments from Castanos, apparently because of his connection with Mr. Kurniawan. Not to be outdone, according to Mr. Castanos, he got his friend Mario Sculatti to consign additional wines for Rudy Kurniawan to Zachys under Mario Sculatti’s name. I do not yet know which Zachys auctions were involved and which wines Mr. Sculatti consigned.

Of further concern given all of the circumstances is an entry from a Yahoo Groups November 2010 posting by Mr. Sculatti that someone forwarded to me yesterday. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bottlecol ... ssage/6019 Mr. Sculatti wrote an email to a website which offers to professionally clean antique bottles as follows:

From: Mario Sculatti <msculatti@...>
To: "goodolebottles@..." <goodolebottles@...>
Sent: Wed, November 17, 2010 1:14:21 AM
Subject: Seal/date wine bottles

Hello there,

I am a collector in California and I am looking to purchase seal/date wine bottles. I wanted to contact your club to see if you can introduce me to any major collectors of seal bottles (wine or olive oils) who might want to sell.

I am buying big right now, really growing my collection, mostly focused on acquiring French and US sealed /dated wine bottles.

Please advise you can introduce me to sellers.

All the best,

Mario Sculatti
1223 Main Street
Saint Helena, CA 94754
707.235.2555

As for my friend Frank Martell, he has chosen his words about Mr. Castanos quite carefully. While I'm sure that Antonio Castanos didn't volunteer to Frank that the wines were from Rudy Kurniawan, that's not the end of the story. As Frank and I have discussed previously, Frank was well aware of the rumors/accusations in the wine industry that Antonio Castanos was acting as Rudy’s broker in selling wines. Frank admittedly knew enough about Antonio Castanos and his alleged relationship with Rudy Kurniawan to be highly suspicious (as he even suggests in his post.) Given that, at an absolute minimum, Frank should have been asking a whole lot of point blank questions about the source of this consignment and its provenance – both to Mario Sculatti and to Antonio Castanos. According to Mr. Castanos, he’s always been up front in answering direct questions about whether Rudy was the source of his wines.

The bottom line is this: No matter how you slice this, the wines should never have been accepted in the first place by Greg Martin Wine Auctions and they should have been pulled from the auction by Heritage Wine Auctions. If Heritage and Greg Martin wanted to proceed with the sale of those lots anyway, then they had an absolute obligation to disclose that the wines were consigned by Antonio Castanos on behalf of Rudy Kurniawan and to disclose Mr. Kurniawan’s known history of association with counterfeit bottles in wines he had previously consigned to auction.

In my view, no amount of vetting of the wines can possibly substitute for, or forgive, the failure to disclose to the public that the wines are sourced from Rudy Kurniawan. Making the judgment call that certain wines in a consignment from Mr. Kurniawan aren’t likely to be fake because of their lesser label status, and then deciding that this somehow justifies selling those bottles without disclosing that Mr. Kurniawan is the source cannot be rationalized or excused.

Finally, let me say that for an auction house to declare that it can separate the legitimate from the counterfeit among a consignment they know is from a suspected counterfeiter is in my view arrogance in the extreme. That is certainly the view the Christies has taken with respect to their sales of wines directly consigned by Rudy Kurniawan in 2009 and 2010. Yet, if you look at the photographs of lots 296 (62 Romanée Conti) and 297 (59 Romanée Conti) in the first Christies auction on September 12, 2009 in NY – the one we tried to stop – and simply look for the Aigu defects, you’ll see that Christie’s missed the boat completely.

The view that “we can ferret out the fakes from among a Kurniwan consignment” also appears to be Heritage’s explanation for proceeding with sale of the Castanos lots. That is sheer folly. Let me cite but one example from the Martin/Heritage June 2011 auction to make my point – the 1966 Romanée Conti – which by the way was NOT consigned by Antonio Castanos.

You will find a very detailed high resolution photo of this case here. http://ww1.prweb.com/prfiles/2011/04/27/1129594/RomaneeContifull.jpg You can click on the photo to enlarge it significantly.

Yes, this wine has the usual Aigu problems. Propriétaire on the second line of the main label has the Aigu and should not in the 1966 vintage. Romanée Conti on the AOC green line is missing its Aigu. But you didn’t need to have this knowledge to realize that these wines are counterfeit. Look carefully at the photograph. The first thing you should notice is that the capsules are different colors – some are a bright cherry red and some are a somewhat darker red-violet color and the two on the far right appear to be violet. Those same two bottles on the far right have the domaine information on the capsule cut off (like a lot of others we’ve seen from Rudy of late). You should also notice that the bottles on the far right are shorter than the others and that the glass appears to be a bit darker (although the latter point is a matter of judgment from a photograph). The shorter bottles and different colored capsules cannot be explained in what is purported to be a pristine OWC case with consecutive bottle numbers.

Notice also that the neck labels are all as white as snow and yet the main labels all look “seasoned” or slightly oxidized. Now look at the strip labels on the bottom. These are the same purported Italian strip labels from Gaja which were on the case of 62 Romanée Conti sold by Acker Merrall in Hong Kong in December 2011 – as discussed earlier in this thread -- which are known to have originated from Rudy Kurniawan via Antonio Castanos. Those strip labels were printed on a Laser printer and have proportional fonts and full justification -- on 43 year old bottles! Finally, although this is a matter of judgment, in my opinion, the wood case looks way too new and unoxidized for a 43-year old wine box and the numbering on the burned in vintage date looks a bit dodgy as well.

Since the 66 Romanée Conti was one of the three featured lots of the auction and it was supposedly given extreme scrutiny before being sold, I am left with extreme doubts about the ability of any of the Heritage personnel to detect what should be obvious discrepancies in the vetting process.

Nice job, Don.