Rudy Kurniawan, the man who changed Californian wines into Romanée-Con

Rudy Kurniawan, l'homme qui changeait des vins Californiens en Romanée-Conti

We tell you the true story of Rudy Kurniawan: The Greatest Wine Forger

THE 12 SLUTS OF BURGUNDY

The year is 2000. Contrary to Nostradamus' predictions, the Earth still revolves around the sun, Trezégoal is about to extinguish Italy one evening in July, and a young Indonesian who introduces himself as Rudy Kurniawan arrives in an America still presided over by Bill Clinton.

Rudy Kurniawan, because that's who we're interested in, was then 24 years old and had absolutely no knowledge of oenology. He discovered wine in a cellar in the Woodland Hill neighborhood of Los Angeles, and in just six months, he developed extraordinary abilities. He was thus offered to join the so elegantly named club of the "12 sluts of Burgundy". It was there that he would taste the greatest wines and impress with his palate and his ability to describe and memorize all the wines he tasted.

NEW YORK, JOHN KAPON AND THE AUCTIONS

When he meets John Kapon, a New York auctioneer who runs a major auction house, Rudy has already started a lucrative business as a forger. His apartment is transformed into a laboratory in which he mixes Californian and Burgundy wines, creates fake labels and tries to reproduce as faithfully as possible the aromas of the great wines he has been drinking daily since his arrival in America.

In 2006, he had an impressive collection of (fake) grands crus: Pétrus, Romanée-Conti, Henri Jayer, Domaine Leroy, Cheval Blanc, Roumier... He owned them all and in exceptional vintages! For example, he had dozens of Romanée-Conti from the 1945 vintage, while Aubert de Villaine, head of the estate, claimed to have never seen one himself.

Money has no smell, but John Kapon has a nose for it. The two new friends organize auctions through which young Rudy, now 30, pockets the modest sum of 35 million dollars.

LAURENT PONSOT, THE FBI AND THE POT AUX ROSES

One morning in 2008, the phone rang at the Ponsot estate in Burgundy, and it was Laurent Ponsot who answered:

Laurent, tell me, an auction house here in New York is offering Clos Saint-Denis from 1945 to 1971. I have never seen any.
From 45 to 71? But that's impossible, the first vintage of Clos Saint-Denis dates from 1982!

Laurent Ponsot boards the first flight to New York and goes to the auction. There he meets Rudy and John, who guarantee the authenticity of the bottles without telling him their origin. Convinced that the two friends are behind these counterfeits, Laurent contacts the FBI, who immediately take the case seriously. After two years of investigation, accumulating evidence at auctions organized by Tic & Tac, FBI agents come to pick up Rudy Kurniawan at his home in Los Angeles. What they discover is mind-blowing: printers, still-rolled labels of fine wines, empty bottles, test tubes and hundreds of bottles ready to be marketed. A laboratory worthy of that of Jesse Pinkman and Walter White at the height of their art. At his trial in 2013, he will be sentenced to 10 years in prison. And that devil John Kapon? Acquitted for lack of evidence. There is only luck for scoundrels.

THE PRISON CASE AND THE RETURN TO BUSINESS

After serving an 8-year sentence, Rudy is released in 2021 with the added bonus of being deported to his native Indonesia. But the insatiable crook resurfaces in 2024 on American soil, where he now organizes dinners washed down with... imitations of legendary grands crus!