Saturday, September 10, 2016

The great wine fraud? Nothing to see here, beer hoarders -- right?



The stakes may be smaller as they pertain to your White Whale stash of "mine all mine" beers, but it might be time to beware the forgers.

Counterfeit Pliny? Well, all it takes is a Koch brother and a few wheelbarrows of cash.

The great wine fraud, by Ed Cumming (The Guardian)

Rudy Kurniwan amassed a vast fortune trading in rare wines. Trouble is, he was bottling them himself. Ed Cumming reports on a vintage swindle

The world’s biggest wine forger started small. It was the early 2000s, and a young man who went by the name of Rudy Kurniawan began to make a name for himself on the Los Angeles scene. He had swept-back hair and a hearty laugh. More importantly, he had pockets of seemingly infinite depth, so his new friends overlooked his mysterious origins. It was said he came from a wealthy Sino-Indonesian family, living large off handouts. But nobody pressed too hard as long as the dinners – and booze – kept flowing.

Kurniawan also had a palate of rare finesse, better than most at identifying the characteristics of different vintages. Or at least, that’s what the people he fooled said ...

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