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1
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And the stock down on Wall Street today
as both the DOW and the S&P 500
2
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closed at all-time highs.
3
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If I told you that you could turn your
love of wine into an investment return...
4
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We've seen prices go up
higher than they've ever been.
5
00:01:34,640 --> 00:01:36,520
...could you forget gold
and invest in vino?
6
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And the bottom line is, if you want
to own a fine or real wine collection,
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the time to buy is right now.
8
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Did you sell 1961 Château La Fleur?
9
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I can taste the Chardonnay on the palate.
10
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Did you sell one or more
1961 Château La Fleur magnums?
11
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I thought it was a little forward.
12
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Who inspected these bottles?
13
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I've got elderflower, perfumed, juicy...
14
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Bright and leafy.
15
00:02:02,200 --> 00:02:04,080
This is the whole
"power of suggestion" thing, right?
16
00:02:04,200 --> 00:02:07,200
Did you have any reason to suspect
that the wine was counterfeit?
17
00:02:36,480 --> 00:02:38,040
Wine is alive.
18
00:02:39,440 --> 00:02:41,200
It's not a beverage.
19
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It's not a tool.
It's not a table or a plate or a car.
20
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It's alive.
21
00:02:51,520 --> 00:02:56,200
You can see how the branches of the vines
are all twisting, tortuous.
22
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It's very traditional.
23
00:02:59,480 --> 00:03:01,800
It's an ancient pruning process,
hardly ever used any more.
24
00:03:01,960 --> 00:03:04,040
We call it 'cup pruning'.
25
00:03:04,720 --> 00:03:09,080
Over time, the branches have grown
and now they look like statues.
26
00:03:09,840 --> 00:03:14,120
It's phantasmagoric,
especially now, in the fog.
27
00:03:15,400 --> 00:03:18,160
But it's also a part of our history.
28
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I am Laurent Ponsot.
29
00:03:22,320 --> 00:03:24,920
Winemaker, vigneron, in Burgundy.
30
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I was born above a cellar in this village
in Morey-Saint-Denis,
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in a family that is owning
this winery since 1872.
32
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You feel here what I call
"the spirit of the vines."
33
00:03:44,640 --> 00:03:49,240
As soon as I started to breathe,
I had the smell of wine.
34
00:03:50,000 --> 00:03:54,560
And I can say that I had some blood
in my wine, not wine in my blood.
35
00:03:58,440 --> 00:04:01,680
The spirit of Burgundy wines is unique,
36
00:04:02,720 --> 00:04:07,080
with the name on the label
representing not only a wine,
37
00:04:07,360 --> 00:04:09,560
but a culture and history.
38
00:04:14,320 --> 00:04:19,720
What people are seeing, feeling,
behind the wine has no price.
39
00:04:20,120 --> 00:04:25,280
At 1,600, $1,600, order bidder 1053.
40
00:04:25,360 --> 00:04:29,200
Lot 982, Romanée-Conti. '72.
41
00:04:29,440 --> 00:04:30,640
Two bottles, wow.
42
00:04:31,040 --> 00:04:32,800
9,500, 10,000.
43
00:04:33,360 --> 00:04:34,960
$10,000 bid now for these at 10,000.
44
00:04:35,400 --> 00:04:37,160
At $10,000, give me 11,000.
45
00:04:37,440 --> 00:04:38,640
At 10,000.
46
00:04:38,720 --> 00:04:41,000
$10,000 now, for 10,000.
47
00:04:41,320 --> 00:04:43,080
11,000 these now for 11,000.
48
00:04:43,160 --> 00:04:44,240
Give me 12,000.
49
00:04:44,320 --> 00:04:45,440
11,000.
50
00:04:45,520 --> 00:04:48,960
$11,000 I have now at 11,000,
it's in the orders.
51
00:04:49,720 --> 00:04:51,160
Boom for 1019.
52
00:04:53,760 --> 00:04:58,160
I guess the auction scene really
started in the 90's, in the dot-com boom.
53
00:04:59,080 --> 00:05:00,880
Everybody was making money.
54
00:05:01,000 --> 00:05:04,960
There developed this culture
of very wealthy collectors
55
00:05:06,040 --> 00:05:08,760
gathering at these auctions
to see and be seen.
56
00:05:08,920 --> 00:05:10,280
To be seen bidding.
57
00:05:10,400 --> 00:05:12,760
The prices started to really escalate.
58
00:05:12,840 --> 00:05:16,800
5,500 go 6,000, 5,500 last call.
59
00:05:16,880 --> 00:05:18,320
At 5,500.
60
00:05:18,400 --> 00:05:20,960
Pass then at 5,500.
61
00:05:21,080 --> 00:05:22,120
1987...
62
00:05:22,200 --> 00:05:24,480
I started to get these emails.
63
00:05:26,240 --> 00:05:29,360
It was strange, I couldn't really
figure out where they were coming from.
64
00:05:29,720 --> 00:05:31,360
They described these evenings
65
00:05:31,440 --> 00:05:34,400
where these guys, very wealthy collectors,
66
00:05:34,480 --> 00:05:39,560
were drinking like 1945 Romanée-Conti,
and 1955 Petrus.
67
00:05:39,640 --> 00:05:43,120
You know really, really expensive wine.
68
00:05:43,200 --> 00:05:46,760
I eventually learned that these emails
were coming from John Kapon,
69
00:05:46,920 --> 00:05:50,040
the head of the auction house
Acker Merrall & Condit.
70
00:05:50,280 --> 00:05:55,760
OWC, 12 bottles of 1990 Romanée-Conti.
71
00:05:56,000 --> 00:05:58,240
They do not make 12 bottle OWCs any more.
72
00:05:58,360 --> 00:06:00,240
I think this in fact was
the last vintage in this...
73
00:06:00,800 --> 00:06:02,160
Kapon's notes were very colourful.
74
00:06:02,280 --> 00:06:04,520
He had these unusual descriptors.
75
00:06:04,600 --> 00:06:08,120
Trying to make the whole
tasting note more interesting
76
00:06:08,200 --> 00:06:10,200
and developing new metaphors.
77
00:06:12,080 --> 00:06:14,080
This culture kind of reached its apogee
78
00:06:14,200 --> 00:06:16,600
under the auspices
of Acker Merrall & Condit
79
00:06:16,680 --> 00:06:19,760
and this group called the Angry Men,
80
00:06:19,840 --> 00:06:20,960
all of whom had nicknames
81
00:06:21,040 --> 00:06:25,240
like Mr Angry and Big Boy
and Hollywood Jef.
82
00:06:29,240 --> 00:06:31,280
We missed the tequila party last night.
83
00:06:31,400 --> 00:06:32,800
But, you know...
84
00:06:32,880 --> 00:06:34,680
-I think it was worth it.
-It was worth it, yeah.
85
00:06:36,440 --> 00:06:39,480
I drank a lot of that
1907 Madeira last night.
86
00:06:39,880 --> 00:06:41,920
-It was...
-It had a lot of layers, that wine.
87
00:06:42,080 --> 00:06:45,760
Yeah, I mean, it was it was coconut,
it was nutmeg, espresso.
88
00:06:45,880 --> 00:06:48,080
Yeah, it was really exciting, wasn't it?
89
00:06:48,960 --> 00:06:51,760
I think the '88 has so much acidity.
90
00:06:52,080 --> 00:06:53,080
It can be incredible.
91
00:06:53,200 --> 00:06:54,800
But it's more a hit-or-miss
vintage than...
92
00:06:54,960 --> 00:06:56,800
The '88 has a huge amount of acidity.
93
00:06:56,920 --> 00:06:58,200
No, that's absolutely right.
94
00:07:02,320 --> 00:07:04,440
'96, though, is the vintage to buy.
95
00:07:04,560 --> 00:07:08,520
For anyone out there,
buy '96 champagne all day.
96
00:07:08,600 --> 00:07:10,480
If you can't afford that, buy '02.
97
00:07:10,600 --> 00:07:12,400
If you can't afford that,
drink fucking beer.
98
00:07:20,880 --> 00:07:23,760
The best way to taste high-end wines
is with a group,
99
00:07:23,920 --> 00:07:25,280
because there's power in numbers.
100
00:07:26,320 --> 00:07:28,040
-Thank you.
-...unique taste of it.
101
00:07:28,680 --> 00:07:33,240
Wines are really, really expensive,
and so our group meets eight times a year.
102
00:07:33,360 --> 00:07:37,240
Each time one member hosts
and does the wines from his cellar.
103
00:07:37,320 --> 00:07:39,160
You guys drink too much together.
104
00:07:40,360 --> 00:07:41,680
You don't hold back!
105
00:07:41,760 --> 00:07:44,240
Where the "Angry Men" name came from
106
00:07:44,320 --> 00:07:46,240
is you get invited to a wine dinner
107
00:07:46,320 --> 00:07:49,280
and you bring a really nice,
a great bottle of wine, okay?
108
00:07:49,440 --> 00:07:52,480
And everybody else brings
shit wine, bad wine.
109
00:07:52,760 --> 00:07:54,440
And so you get very angry and...
110
00:07:55,320 --> 00:07:57,680
It was men who didn't want to be
angry any more
111
00:07:57,760 --> 00:08:01,440
and everybody had to bring it,
you know, you had to really bring it.
112
00:08:02,840 --> 00:08:04,040
Thank you very much.
113
00:08:04,320 --> 00:08:06,800
My entry into Burgundy was Rudy Kurniawan.
114
00:08:07,560 --> 00:08:11,000
There was an Angry Men
that Rudy had invited me to,
115
00:08:11,080 --> 00:08:12,920
and that's where I met that whole gang.
116
00:08:13,800 --> 00:08:17,160
Their dinners were always
over the top. Crazy.
117
00:08:17,400 --> 00:08:21,680
Breaking it out with like 100,
200 grand worth of wine in a night.
118
00:08:21,960 --> 00:08:23,280
It was pretty extraordinary.
119
00:08:25,880 --> 00:08:29,760
What these guys actually had,
is what Americans call "fuck you money."
120
00:08:29,920 --> 00:08:32,280
"Well, I got a $3-million bonus,
121
00:08:32,640 --> 00:08:34,200
"I'm going to take a million
of that and blow it."
122
00:08:34,280 --> 00:08:35,400
And that's their "fuck you money."
123
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They're going to do
whatever they want with it.
124
00:08:36,840 --> 00:08:39,800
They don't care, there's no consequences.
125
00:08:39,880 --> 00:08:44,480
And it's a kind of money
that most human beings never experience.
126
00:08:45,760 --> 00:08:46,840
Here she comes.
127
00:08:50,120 --> 00:08:52,360
The fine-wine world,
it's really mostly men.
128
00:08:53,720 --> 00:08:55,280
Especially when I was younger,
129
00:08:55,480 --> 00:08:58,440
I'd walk into the tastings and everybody
would immediately ask,
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00:08:58,520 --> 00:09:00,400
you know, whose date I was.
131
00:09:00,480 --> 00:09:03,520
But I had an important job.
I ran a major auction house in New York.
132
00:09:04,240 --> 00:09:07,800
I bought like $50,000 worth of champagne
in the last auction,
133
00:09:07,880 --> 00:09:10,040
for one of my clients
'cause his daughter's getting married.
134
00:09:10,920 --> 00:09:13,080
It was 2000 or early 2001.
135
00:09:13,240 --> 00:09:14,600
We were doing auctions
136
00:09:14,680 --> 00:09:17,720
and I started being aware of this kind of,
137
00:09:17,800 --> 00:09:22,360
you know, skinny, geeky young guy
that liked wine.
138
00:09:30,960 --> 00:09:33,680
...for 2,600.
139
00:09:35,080 --> 00:09:38,600
At the time he was somebody
that was bidding on Pahlmeyer Merlot.
140
00:09:38,680 --> 00:09:40,960
Pahlmeyer Merlot sticks out
in my mind with Rudy.
141
00:09:41,080 --> 00:09:42,760
You know, a high quality wine,
142
00:09:42,840 --> 00:09:47,120
but, you know,
it's got one zero, not four zeros.
143
00:09:47,240 --> 00:09:49,040
Now 16, 17, $1,800,
144
00:09:49,120 --> 00:09:52,160
1,800 for the single bottle
of La Tâche, 1985.
145
00:09:52,240 --> 00:09:55,000
1,800, $1,800 bid. At 18...
146
00:09:55,080 --> 00:09:57,880
What was really strange
was 18 months later
147
00:09:57,960 --> 00:10:01,480
he reached out to me on the telephone
and said that he wanted to meet with me
148
00:10:02,000 --> 00:10:05,000
because he wanted to be a player
in the auction scene,
149
00:10:05,160 --> 00:10:06,280
which I found kind of odd
150
00:10:06,360 --> 00:10:10,360
because he had just been
a geeky kid drinking Californian Merlot.
151
00:10:12,880 --> 00:10:14,000
-Hey, what's up, Rudy?
-Hey, what's up, man?
152
00:10:14,080 --> 00:10:15,680
-How are you doing?
-How are you, man?
153
00:10:15,760 --> 00:10:17,080
-Very well.
-Good, good, good.
154
00:10:17,160 --> 00:10:21,040
I brought some wines for us to drink.
Can you help me with this?
155
00:10:21,240 --> 00:10:24,880
His breadth of knowledge seemed
to be pretty extraordinary.
156
00:10:25,000 --> 00:10:28,480
He actually taught me, you know,
almost everything I know.
157
00:10:30,000 --> 00:10:32,960
He was a real cult figure
and everybody talked about him.
158
00:10:33,080 --> 00:10:34,400
My friend.
159
00:10:36,600 --> 00:10:40,120
He had this mysterious background.
Where did he come from?
160
00:10:41,600 --> 00:10:44,080
Part of what created his mythology
161
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was he had an extraordinary...
Who has an extraordinary palate.
162
00:10:49,880 --> 00:10:52,920
The best palate of anyone
I've ever met in my entire life.
163
00:10:53,840 --> 00:10:59,320
Any wine, from California to France,
any type of wine, any vintage.
164
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Rudy was extremely, insanely,
165
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unbelievably correct on all the wines.
166
00:11:12,560 --> 00:11:13,960
The art of blind tasting,
167
00:11:14,040 --> 00:11:17,240
it comes naturally,
but you have to make an effort.
168
00:11:17,360 --> 00:11:18,920
You know, you really have to work at it.
169
00:11:20,400 --> 00:11:22,360
You taste wine blind,
you identify the wine,
170
00:11:22,440 --> 00:11:25,560
and you know, that's the badge of honour
for a sommelier.
171
00:11:26,360 --> 00:11:30,680
You do a little swirl and just see
if there's anything with the alcohol.
172
00:11:31,160 --> 00:11:34,120
Looking at the legs,
how slow or fast they fall.
173
00:11:35,600 --> 00:11:40,600
Smell it, and then it kind of just
tingles off senses to your brain.
174
00:11:41,320 --> 00:11:44,360
And then you look through
your rolodex in your mind
175
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of all these different wines
you've tasted.
176
00:11:46,720 --> 00:11:48,800
And I'm thinking, "What could this be?"
177
00:11:53,360 --> 00:11:56,800
I think a wine palate
is very similar to athletic ability.
178
00:12:01,880 --> 00:12:03,040
Sorry.
179
00:12:07,440 --> 00:12:10,760
Wine tasting is a lot about
knowing the vocabulary
180
00:12:10,840 --> 00:12:13,720
and being able to express,
using that vocabulary,
181
00:12:13,800 --> 00:12:17,000
to other wine tasters
what it is that you're experiencing.
182
00:12:17,400 --> 00:12:20,400
I totally get that peppery citrus
that you're talking about.
183
00:12:22,920 --> 00:12:24,640
Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I met Rudy.
184
00:12:26,600 --> 00:12:27,720
Tony!
185
00:12:27,800 --> 00:12:29,440
-Tony, what's happening?
-What's up, Tony?
186
00:12:30,080 --> 00:12:34,120
I met him at a tasting.
I was very, very impressed.
187
00:12:34,200 --> 00:12:38,400
He identified almost all the wines blind.
188
00:12:38,560 --> 00:12:41,880
He must have learned by drinking
an enormous amount of different wines.
189
00:12:43,200 --> 00:12:44,600
That's the only way to learn.
190
00:12:46,240 --> 00:12:48,560
You always wondered why and how.
191
00:12:48,760 --> 00:12:49,880
That's why you know.
192
00:12:49,960 --> 00:12:53,000
You know, 18 months and now I have, what,
193
00:12:53,080 --> 00:12:55,640
pretty much like 3,000 bottles of wine,
you know.
194
00:12:56,000 --> 00:12:57,880
We're going to make a booklet,
you know, yeah.
195
00:12:57,960 --> 00:12:59,120
Rudy's Adventures.
196
00:13:07,120 --> 00:13:10,640
I met Rudy first in 2004, I believe.
197
00:13:11,360 --> 00:13:13,960
There was a luncheon
for one of the producers
198
00:13:14,040 --> 00:13:16,120
and we quickly became friends.
199
00:13:17,880 --> 00:13:19,800
He was very warm to everyone.
200
00:13:19,920 --> 00:13:21,560
I really liked the guy.
201
00:13:23,200 --> 00:13:26,400
It's fun because there's
a lot of wines today that I haven't tried.
202
00:13:26,480 --> 00:13:28,840
We hung out a lot
and went to wine dinners.
203
00:13:28,920 --> 00:13:30,680
-How you doing today?
-Good, man.
204
00:13:31,400 --> 00:13:33,040
Tired, but good.
205
00:13:33,840 --> 00:13:36,000
-Long trip?
-From 5:00 a.m. in the morning.
206
00:13:36,520 --> 00:13:37,600
Long trip.
207
00:13:39,280 --> 00:13:41,160
Fourteen hours drive.
208
00:13:41,240 --> 00:13:43,320
-Where'd you drive from?
-LA, man.
209
00:13:44,040 --> 00:13:45,120
LA, man.
210
00:13:45,480 --> 00:13:48,800
The people in this town,
excuse my language, are full of shit.
211
00:13:49,040 --> 00:13:50,600
But not with Rudy.
212
00:13:50,720 --> 00:13:51,760
Just wakes me up, you know.
213
00:13:51,880 --> 00:13:56,800
Nothing he did was short of real class,
warmth and graciousness.
214
00:13:57,000 --> 00:13:58,600
You like... You like everything so far?
215
00:13:59,080 --> 00:14:03,680
For my birthday he gave me a bottle of,
I think a Pol Roger '49 champagne,
216
00:14:03,760 --> 00:14:06,000
which is incredible.
217
00:14:06,480 --> 00:14:09,480
-What do you have right now?
-Colgin, interesting.
218
00:14:09,560 --> 00:14:14,080
-Yeah?
-Very different from the Herb lamb.
219
00:14:14,560 --> 00:14:15,680
Yeah?
220
00:14:16,360 --> 00:14:20,720
I don't know if it's 100%
Cab because... Like a Meritage.
221
00:14:21,120 --> 00:14:25,160
He was just a lover of wine.
Is a lover of wine.
222
00:14:25,240 --> 00:14:28,600
I keep talking in the past
because it's still very strange.
223
00:14:33,280 --> 00:14:38,120
He never said something to me
that I could look at and find was untrue.
224
00:14:40,280 --> 00:14:41,560
But he didn't ever say that much.
225
00:14:43,000 --> 00:14:46,640
I was a reporter and I was curious
about the auction market,
226
00:14:46,840 --> 00:14:51,720
and I sat there at the back of Christie's
and I noticed a very, very young man
227
00:14:51,880 --> 00:14:55,880
spending a lot of money
surrounded by people that I knew
228
00:14:55,960 --> 00:15:00,000
were movie producers,
clearly the focus of everyone's attention.
229
00:15:01,760 --> 00:15:02,800
That's a story.
230
00:15:03,040 --> 00:15:06,200
Who is this guy?
And why is he spending this kind of money?
231
00:15:06,280 --> 00:15:08,360
And what does he want to do with his wine?
232
00:15:08,880 --> 00:15:12,680
Today I can't, today's overbooked.
Tomorrow, call me. I might...
233
00:15:13,160 --> 00:15:16,760
It took months to get him to sit down
and have a cup of coffee with me.
234
00:15:17,080 --> 00:15:18,640
I've got to go in five minutes.
235
00:15:19,440 --> 00:15:20,760
I have a big Burgundy tasting.
236
00:15:21,200 --> 00:15:23,240
-Let me move around before...
-Go ahead! Go ahead! Go ahead!
237
00:15:23,320 --> 00:15:24,440
I'll talk to you soon.
238
00:15:24,920 --> 00:15:27,760
Let me have the honour to try my wine.
239
00:15:27,880 --> 00:15:29,640
It was like another month or two
240
00:15:29,720 --> 00:15:34,200
before I got him to sit down and actually
have an interview with me.
241
00:15:35,600 --> 00:15:38,200
He proceeded to serve
some of his great wines.
242
00:15:38,960 --> 00:15:42,800
Oh, my God, this is... It's corked.
243
00:15:45,720 --> 00:15:46,920
No.
244
00:15:49,360 --> 00:15:52,320
He lived with his mother in Arcadia
245
00:15:52,480 --> 00:15:54,800
and the people around him would say
246
00:15:54,880 --> 00:15:57,640
that his family owned
the Heineken distributorship
247
00:15:57,760 --> 00:15:59,160
for all of China.
248
00:15:59,240 --> 00:16:00,360
Fabulously wealthy,
249
00:16:00,440 --> 00:16:05,160
and he was on a million-dollar-a-month
allowance for his wine,
250
00:16:05,280 --> 00:16:08,960
and when I asked Rudy about this stuff
he said, "I don't talk about my family",
251
00:16:09,040 --> 00:16:10,480
and he wouldn't tell me anything.
252
00:16:12,480 --> 00:16:18,600
I sort of assumed he was a rich kid
looking for something to do.
253
00:16:20,960 --> 00:16:23,200
The auction houses were giddy.
254
00:16:23,480 --> 00:16:26,920
No one had ever spent
that much money that fast.
255
00:16:28,720 --> 00:16:33,320
It was ruining the quiet little club
that the old guys had.
256
00:16:36,360 --> 00:16:39,040
I've been collecting for 38 years I guess.
257
00:16:41,160 --> 00:16:44,880
So, I've got, you know, lots of DRC labels
258
00:16:44,960 --> 00:16:51,200
and they're all categorised by particular
domains or groups of domains.
259
00:16:52,720 --> 00:16:57,040
There's Ponsots in here.
I've got mostly from the '80s.
260
00:16:57,200 --> 00:17:00,000
That's some major wine, yeah, that's his,
one of his best.
261
00:17:01,000 --> 00:17:02,880
Sometimes you only get to taste them
once in your life
262
00:17:02,960 --> 00:17:05,840
if you get to taste them at all,
so it's kind of fun.
263
00:17:08,120 --> 00:17:11,080
I was introduced to Rudy by John Kapon
264
00:17:11,160 --> 00:17:14,120
at an Acker auction event
over in Beverly Hills.
265
00:17:14,760 --> 00:17:16,120
I want to drink Burgundies.
266
00:17:16,880 --> 00:17:18,520
That's me, of course, you know.
267
00:17:18,640 --> 00:17:21,880
He said, "Well, you're a Burgundy
collector, what Burgundies do you like?"
268
00:17:22,120 --> 00:17:25,280
And I said, "Well, my favourites
are probably Roumier, Rousseau
269
00:17:25,360 --> 00:17:27,320
"and DRC,- Romanée-Conti."
270
00:17:29,080 --> 00:17:31,480
You got that right, my friend,
you got that right.
271
00:17:31,640 --> 00:17:34,200
Right after that he said,
"You should buy wines with me",
272
00:17:34,280 --> 00:17:37,600
he said, "I buy cellars and collections
in Europe all the time."
273
00:17:39,080 --> 00:17:40,640
And then I remember Rudy asked me,
274
00:17:40,720 --> 00:17:43,480
"What's the oldest Roumier
you've ever had?"
275
00:17:43,600 --> 00:17:45,560
And I said it was a 1969.
276
00:17:46,200 --> 00:17:48,800
And I told him I'd been lucky enough
to find a couple at auction,
277
00:17:48,880 --> 00:17:50,400
that they're real hard to find.
278
00:17:50,560 --> 00:17:51,640
And then Rudy said,
279
00:17:51,720 --> 00:17:54,080
"Well, you know, in the last year I've had
280
00:17:54,280 --> 00:17:57,880
"1945, 1949, 1955
281
00:17:58,240 --> 00:18:00,800
"and 1962 Roumier Bonnes-Mares."
282
00:18:02,920 --> 00:18:07,240
He picked the greatest red Burgundy
vintages from that era.
283
00:18:07,320 --> 00:18:09,400
I was just flabbergasted.
284
00:18:11,240 --> 00:18:13,520
I'd been looking for them for 25 years.
285
00:18:22,280 --> 00:18:24,680
Burgundy is unique on the planet.
286
00:18:25,400 --> 00:18:31,160
The band of slopes, we say, which is
70 kilometres long and 1 kilometre wide,
287
00:18:31,280 --> 00:18:35,360
and composed
by 1,250 different appellations.
288
00:18:37,560 --> 00:18:39,880
There are a lot of grapes this year
289
00:18:40,680 --> 00:18:44,000
...but we won't see how it turns out
until the harvest.
290
00:18:46,240 --> 00:18:49,920
Heaven, they say, is above us...
291
00:18:50,800 --> 00:18:52,520
...but I believe that in Burgundy
it is down below.
292
00:18:52,800 --> 00:18:55,200
Down below in the cellar
and in the roots of the vines.
293
00:18:58,000 --> 00:19:01,520
We are just 11 metres
below the ground level here
294
00:19:01,640 --> 00:19:05,760
and we are really with two feet
in the history of Burgundy.
295
00:19:06,240 --> 00:19:12,760
See here are tiny roots, from vines,
which are probably here since 200 years.
296
00:19:13,640 --> 00:19:16,080
The vine is sucking, so to say, the rock.
297
00:19:17,640 --> 00:19:20,040
Going up on the hill on
the other side of the street,
298
00:19:20,120 --> 00:19:22,800
the vines will not find
the same mineral elements
299
00:19:22,880 --> 00:19:26,400
and they will never find the same taste
and aromas.
300
00:19:29,360 --> 00:19:31,920
The most important for me
is what nature gives.
301
00:19:32,240 --> 00:19:34,600
We are only a tiny element of the chain.
302
00:19:35,040 --> 00:19:41,920
If one element breaks, the chain is broken
and you cannot reach the glass of wine.
303
00:19:45,200 --> 00:19:47,560
Wine is the expression of place,
304
00:19:47,640 --> 00:19:50,840
and Burgundy is the ultimate
example of this.
305
00:19:51,880 --> 00:19:53,960
It's a wine for obsessives.
306
00:19:54,760 --> 00:19:57,600
Someone who really knows their stuff
307
00:19:57,680 --> 00:20:00,800
can tell you the difference, blind,
between something that was grown here
308
00:20:00,880 --> 00:20:03,000
and something that was grown 40 feet away.
309
00:20:03,800 --> 00:20:05,720
-It's really good.
-Look at where the fill is.
310
00:20:05,800 --> 00:20:07,280
Fucking incredible.
311
00:20:07,360 --> 00:20:09,000
This is probably insane.
312
00:20:09,480 --> 00:20:10,920
This is where I go crazy.
313
00:20:11,000 --> 00:20:13,600
This is my crazy... This is my crazy spot.
314
00:20:14,640 --> 00:20:17,520
I get nervous
and my blood pressure goes up.
315
00:20:19,280 --> 00:20:22,360
It's the ultimate existential art form.
316
00:20:22,440 --> 00:20:25,240
It's living in a bottle. It's alive.
317
00:20:25,360 --> 00:20:28,120
And then you drink it
and you absorb it into your body.
318
00:20:28,200 --> 00:20:30,520
It's art that becomes
part of you, literally.
319
00:20:31,200 --> 00:20:34,080
Well, that's Ponsot,
who's a great producer.
320
00:20:34,480 --> 00:20:35,720
-Hey, Carl.
-Hello!
321
00:20:35,800 --> 00:20:37,400
How you doing, babe?
322
00:20:37,480 --> 00:20:38,760
I'm good.
323
00:20:39,000 --> 00:20:40,400
A lot of good shit here.
324
00:20:41,360 --> 00:20:44,080
You have a few drinks and then you come
here and spend 100 grand on wine.
325
00:20:44,440 --> 00:20:45,960
This is the place.
326
00:20:46,080 --> 00:20:47,400
This is the place, yeah.
327
00:20:50,600 --> 00:20:53,360
They're very, very reasonably priced.
328
00:20:53,600 --> 00:20:57,040
Where can you get a '61 white
for 600 bucks?
329
00:20:57,960 --> 00:20:59,080
From 1961?
330
00:20:59,840 --> 00:21:01,120
This is crazy time.
331
00:21:03,560 --> 00:21:04,640
-Jef?
-Yeah.
332
00:21:05,280 --> 00:21:07,200
1990 Romanée-Conti.
333
00:21:07,280 --> 00:21:10,960
This is maybe one of the greatest bottles
ever made of wine.
334
00:21:11,040 --> 00:21:12,360
Right here.
335
00:21:12,440 --> 00:21:13,880
-20 grand maybe?
-20 grand.
336
00:21:14,000 --> 00:21:16,280
-He knows his prices.
-20 grand for the bottle.
337
00:21:16,360 --> 00:21:17,560
And you want this.
338
00:21:17,680 --> 00:21:21,960
If you like wine, you need this,
you want this.
339
00:21:22,080 --> 00:21:24,120
But you have to decide,
do you want this or do you want a Prius?
340
00:21:24,200 --> 00:21:26,240
Yes, exactly! Trade it for a Prius.
341
00:21:26,960 --> 00:21:29,200
When we drink wine we don't look
at the price value, you know.
342
00:21:29,960 --> 00:21:33,440
We look at what we get from the wine.
The excitement, you know.
343
00:21:33,560 --> 00:21:36,320
The passion, the way they make
the wine and everything.
344
00:21:36,400 --> 00:21:39,120
It's not about the price of the wine,
you know. Some people...
345
00:21:39,200 --> 00:21:42,280
Rudy was very generous with everybody.
346
00:21:42,400 --> 00:21:45,640
I had some of the greatest
Romanée-Contis with him, you know,
347
00:21:45,720 --> 00:21:47,720
I will ever have.
348
00:21:48,680 --> 00:21:49,960
Put on your best Burgundy face.
349
00:21:53,800 --> 00:21:54,920
Who wants to drink wine?
350
00:21:55,000 --> 00:22:00,520
At the time when all this was happening,
there was a huge demand for old fine wine.
351
00:22:02,120 --> 00:22:07,480
As a whole, Burgundy very quickly went
from affordable to unobtainable.
352
00:22:08,680 --> 00:22:10,760
I guess you can call it the Rudy era.
353
00:22:11,600 --> 00:22:14,880
It's very fine sediment, so stand them up
and then put the ice.
354
00:22:15,000 --> 00:22:16,400
The economy was booming back then.
355
00:22:16,480 --> 00:22:17,800
...standing up, not leaning down.
356
00:22:18,520 --> 00:22:21,960
There was such tiny quantities
of Burgundy worldwide.
357
00:22:23,240 --> 00:22:26,840
There wasn't enough to satisfy the thirst.
358
00:22:28,000 --> 00:22:30,480
It was all about liquidity
and it continues to be.
359
00:22:30,560 --> 00:22:33,240
Any time there's tremendous
volatility in a market,
360
00:22:33,320 --> 00:22:35,120
and all asset classes move the same.
361
00:22:35,400 --> 00:22:37,120
Dave, your go-to cellar's pretty good.
362
00:22:37,480 --> 00:22:38,680
You've got some good stuff in here.
363
00:22:39,120 --> 00:22:42,120
So many of my friends
in finance collect wine
364
00:22:42,200 --> 00:22:46,360
because when you watch stocks
all day on Bloomberg, right,
365
00:22:46,560 --> 00:22:49,200
and then you can see auction prices move,
366
00:22:49,280 --> 00:22:51,400
there's a certain pride
to getting a good buy.
367
00:22:52,560 --> 00:22:55,880
Today there is no relation between
the prices and what is in the bottle.
368
00:22:56,880 --> 00:22:59,920
When I sell a bottle at €100,
369
00:23:00,000 --> 00:23:04,920
I see this bottle when it's released
at 1,000.
370
00:23:05,000 --> 00:23:06,040
How come?
371
00:23:06,600 --> 00:23:09,400
At $2,600, I ask the bidder
against the room.
372
00:23:09,840 --> 00:23:13,120
-Sold at...
-Dude, I just opened a bottle on Thursday.
373
00:23:13,520 --> 00:23:15,960
-Yeah?
-Now I feel bad about opening it.
374
00:23:16,800 --> 00:23:18,040
It's a 1,000 a bottle.
375
00:23:22,000 --> 00:23:24,360
Can I refill it and put the cork back?
376
00:23:26,360 --> 00:23:29,000
It was clear to me in very short order
377
00:23:29,080 --> 00:23:32,320
that he had revolutionised
the wine market.
378
00:23:32,400 --> 00:23:34,200
Prices were skyrocketing.
379
00:23:34,280 --> 00:23:37,920
I thought it was
a pretty smart little racket.
380
00:23:38,000 --> 00:23:41,520
He was cornering the market
in a lot of these wines.
381
00:23:41,600 --> 00:23:43,760
What a clever thing to do.
382
00:23:43,840 --> 00:23:49,320
If you have a lot of money,
go in, buy up a lot of wine,
383
00:23:50,200 --> 00:23:53,880
drive up the prices, and then
start selling at the new high price.
384
00:23:55,800 --> 00:24:00,960
There was one other guy there who was
always bidding furiously against Rudy
385
00:24:01,040 --> 00:24:04,840
and that guy was the representative
for Bill Koch.
386
00:24:12,440 --> 00:24:16,160
Collecting has to have
an emotional meaning to me.
387
00:24:17,400 --> 00:24:21,400
Part of it is the detective story
of tracking it all down.
388
00:24:26,800 --> 00:24:31,840
I've collected impressionistic art,
I've collected samurai swords,
389
00:24:31,960 --> 00:24:35,160
silver coins from Greece,
have some antiquities,
390
00:24:35,320 --> 00:24:37,080
have some sculpture.
391
00:24:37,280 --> 00:24:39,480
And I've collected wine.
392
00:24:44,640 --> 00:24:46,520
Do you want to see my wine bathroom?
393
00:24:46,600 --> 00:24:47,880
The bathroom is generally a bathroom,
394
00:24:47,960 --> 00:24:50,400
but I thought I'd be more fun
to make it interesting,
395
00:24:50,520 --> 00:24:54,240
so we put wine crates here, wine labels,
corks on the ceiling,
396
00:24:54,320 --> 00:25:00,520
and then if you look over there,
there are wine bottles on that wall.
397
00:25:04,320 --> 00:25:08,400
My secret wine opener. Wine opener.
398
00:25:08,480 --> 00:25:11,960
Not wine opener, cellar opener.
Come on in.
399
00:25:18,280 --> 00:25:21,920
I've been a little bit obsessive
about buying wine in the past.
400
00:25:23,080 --> 00:25:26,440
I have in total 43,000 bottles.
401
00:25:28,000 --> 00:25:34,280
With super fine wines you can taste
the love the vintner had in making it.
402
00:25:34,440 --> 00:25:37,960
And that to me is almost
a religious experience.
403
00:25:38,040 --> 00:25:41,240
You know, we collectors
like precious things.
404
00:25:41,320 --> 00:25:43,440
Love is extremely precious.
405
00:25:43,920 --> 00:25:47,800
What price can you put
on the love of your wife?
406
00:25:47,880 --> 00:25:50,960
What price... Well, if you're getting
a divorce, you can, but...
407
00:25:52,960 --> 00:25:55,440
Here's one bottle of Jefferson wine.
408
00:25:56,080 --> 00:25:59,000
1787 Lafite, Th.J.
409
00:26:00,400 --> 00:26:02,160
I'll set it down on the table.
410
00:26:03,760 --> 00:26:05,920
We'll line them up.
411
00:26:08,040 --> 00:26:13,600
The reason I wanted to buy four bottles
of Thomas Jefferson wine is very simple.
412
00:26:13,720 --> 00:26:16,880
The mere fact that Thomas Jefferson
owned it
413
00:26:16,960 --> 00:26:21,680
and held it in his hand, et cetera,
et cetera, that's part of history.
414
00:26:22,240 --> 00:26:27,160
Here's another one.
1787 Mouton, again Th.J.
415
00:26:27,640 --> 00:26:29,840
Look at this bottle.
416
00:26:29,920 --> 00:26:32,880
Isn't it beautiful in and of itself?
417
00:26:33,000 --> 00:26:37,040
1737 Lafite, Château Rothschild.
418
00:26:37,160 --> 00:26:40,200
The faker didn't know
his wine history very well
419
00:26:40,280 --> 00:26:44,680
because the Rothschilds
didn't own Lafite in 1737.
420
00:26:47,320 --> 00:26:51,080
Unfortunately, I paid $100,000 per bottle.
421
00:26:51,240 --> 00:26:52,960
The rogues' gallery.
422
00:26:56,720 --> 00:26:58,720
Well, the first time I think
I found a fake wine
423
00:26:59,040 --> 00:27:01,960
it was because of the weight
of the bottle.
424
00:27:02,280 --> 00:27:05,000
There was a bottle of Petrus
on the back of the table
425
00:27:05,080 --> 00:27:06,560
and I reached to grab it,
426
00:27:06,680 --> 00:27:10,640
and when I lifted it up I almost threw it
on the ceiling 'cause it was so light.
427
00:27:10,960 --> 00:27:13,280
-This has a '75 seal on it.
-Yeah.
428
00:27:13,360 --> 00:27:15,720
-But it's a 1929.
-Yeah.
429
00:27:15,800 --> 00:27:19,480
That only started with the 1930 vintage.
430
00:27:19,640 --> 00:27:21,200
You're looking for anomalies.
431
00:27:21,280 --> 00:27:24,440
Is it in the right glass?
Does the cork have the right stamp?
432
00:27:24,680 --> 00:27:28,520
Is the cork properly aged?
Is the paper correct?
433
00:27:28,800 --> 00:27:30,520
Yeah, everything's pixelated here.
434
00:27:31,440 --> 00:27:33,880
I wonder what the sediment in here is?
435
00:27:33,960 --> 00:27:37,520
If these things have allegedly been
together for the last 60 years,
436
00:27:37,600 --> 00:27:38,880
they need to look like it.
437
00:27:38,960 --> 00:27:40,760
That is one hot mess.
438
00:27:42,320 --> 00:27:46,560
If the capsule looks like hell,
and the label looks pristine,
439
00:27:46,640 --> 00:27:48,000
that doesn't work.
440
00:27:48,080 --> 00:27:52,040
You know, that's got a 95-year-old's face
on a teenager's body.
441
00:27:52,560 --> 00:27:54,840
You know, you always want to be careful
with these online auctions
442
00:27:54,920 --> 00:27:57,080
because you never know the provenance.
443
00:27:57,160 --> 00:27:59,000
They just want to sell.
444
00:27:59,640 --> 00:28:01,360
Really it's hard.
445
00:28:01,520 --> 00:28:03,280
This bottle's corked, man.
446
00:28:04,240 --> 00:28:05,440
No, I'm just kidding.
447
00:28:07,120 --> 00:28:08,560
I love doing that shit.
448
00:28:08,760 --> 00:28:13,880
At the time fake wine was just
starting to be talked about,
449
00:28:13,960 --> 00:28:15,880
Rudy was quite the expert on fake wine
450
00:28:15,960 --> 00:28:20,600
and when I asked him about it, he said
that he bought so much fake wine
451
00:28:20,680 --> 00:28:22,880
that he'd had to become an expert on it.
452
00:28:23,360 --> 00:28:25,080
No, they won't tell you
if there's something wrong with it,
453
00:28:25,160 --> 00:28:27,480
but sometimes if they doubt
the bottle, they put the picture of it,
454
00:28:27,560 --> 00:28:28,760
-so you be the judge.
-Okay.
455
00:28:28,840 --> 00:28:31,760
Look at the picture, you want it,
you take it, you know.
456
00:28:31,880 --> 00:28:34,280
Is there anybody out there looking
at conditions and...
457
00:28:37,040 --> 00:28:38,360
Tell them about Acker auctions.
458
00:28:41,240 --> 00:28:43,200
Acker's great man, we love John.
459
00:28:44,560 --> 00:28:49,040
He and John Kapon were meticulously
going through all of his wines
460
00:28:49,120 --> 00:28:51,600
to catalogue everything and sell some off.
461
00:28:53,520 --> 00:28:59,840
John Kapon was the son of a very nice
family-run wine store in Manhattan.
462
00:29:00,400 --> 00:29:03,240
Shopping for anything during the holidays
can be simply maddening,
463
00:29:03,320 --> 00:29:05,640
and shopping for wine is no exception.
464
00:29:06,040 --> 00:29:08,560
I'm here at Acker Merrall and Condit,
465
00:29:08,720 --> 00:29:11,440
the oldest wine store in America,
located in New York City.
466
00:29:11,600 --> 00:29:13,480
Acker Merrall wasn't a big house,
467
00:29:13,560 --> 00:29:17,640
they were a store that got
into the auction world
468
00:29:17,760 --> 00:29:19,720
and then Rudy really made them.
469
00:29:22,560 --> 00:29:24,880
John really turned it into a fun thing.
470
00:29:25,360 --> 00:29:28,240
He was the first one to like,
break it out.
471
00:29:29,800 --> 00:29:32,240
It was like a giant crazy party
with an auction.
472
00:29:32,960 --> 00:29:37,920
At the same time he was doing that, Rudy
came along, with this incredible cellar
473
00:29:38,000 --> 00:29:40,160
and they kind of helped each other.
474
00:29:48,600 --> 00:29:51,280
When Rudy was drinking California Merlot,
475
00:29:51,520 --> 00:29:54,640
Acker Merrall & Condit was in last place
of all the auction houses.
476
00:29:55,520 --> 00:29:59,840
When Rudy sold $35 million worth of wine
through Acker Merrall & Condit
477
00:29:59,920 --> 00:30:02,080
in two sales in 2006,
478
00:30:02,160 --> 00:30:05,320
Acker Merrall became the number one
auction house in the world.
479
00:30:05,600 --> 00:30:08,440
He is the CEO of Acker Merrall & Condit.
480
00:30:08,520 --> 00:30:12,040
This year he has auctioned off
more than $100 million,
481
00:30:12,120 --> 00:30:14,360
the first wine house to do so.
482
00:30:14,440 --> 00:30:18,200
John Kapon, joining me, so you can't
whine about that revenue, right?
483
00:30:18,280 --> 00:30:19,320
Get it, "whine."
484
00:30:19,440 --> 00:30:20,960
John, you're going to leave now,
aren't you? All right.
485
00:30:21,040 --> 00:30:23,400
Well, it's been a pretty crazy year...
486
00:30:23,480 --> 00:30:26,640
"There's not much that can be said
about this collection
487
00:30:26,960 --> 00:30:30,720
"outside of the fact,
it is one of America's greatest.
488
00:30:30,800 --> 00:30:34,200
"This is a collector
that actually inspects his wine."
489
00:30:35,520 --> 00:30:37,280
To see all the magnificent wines in there,
490
00:30:37,520 --> 00:30:41,240
I said, "Man, this is
a wine collector's dream."
491
00:30:41,400 --> 00:30:44,640
I felt like maybe I ought to buy
the whole bloody cellar.
492
00:30:45,720 --> 00:30:49,000
You know, the auction is
a complex transaction.
493
00:30:49,080 --> 00:30:51,400
I mean, you get a catalogue,
it's 300 pages long
494
00:30:51,480 --> 00:30:52,880
and you have two weeks
to make up your mind.
495
00:30:52,960 --> 00:30:54,960
You may win, you may not win.
Some people...
496
00:30:55,040 --> 00:30:57,280
They were selling massive amounts of wine,
497
00:30:57,360 --> 00:31:00,840
and, you know, I don't know how John could
have inspected every single bottle
498
00:31:00,920 --> 00:31:04,240
when he's selling
$30 million worth of wine.
499
00:31:07,120 --> 00:31:12,080
The fakers like to fake
the very hard to find,
500
00:31:12,160 --> 00:31:14,520
very old wines 'cause you give them
a much higher price.
501
00:31:16,560 --> 00:31:20,480
One night my bulldog investigator,
Brad Goldstein,
502
00:31:20,560 --> 00:31:26,520
found that I had just paid 25,000
for one 1921 magnum of Petrus.
503
00:31:27,360 --> 00:31:31,520
In 1921 Petrus made no magnums.
504
00:31:31,840 --> 00:31:33,400
You gotta go, big guy.
505
00:31:35,120 --> 00:31:37,120
You gotta go.
You wanna go, you wanna go get Mommy?
506
00:31:38,320 --> 00:31:40,640
Come on. Come on. Come on.
507
00:31:40,760 --> 00:31:47,520
Bill kept saying to me, "I want to know
how deep this problem is in my cellar."
508
00:31:48,800 --> 00:31:49,920
Where are the Ponsots?
509
00:31:50,000 --> 00:31:51,400
Where are the Ponsots? I don't see them.
510
00:31:52,000 --> 00:31:54,400
We had to find experts
who knew about corks.
511
00:31:54,520 --> 00:31:58,880
We hired a guy who knew about labels,
capsules, glass,
512
00:31:58,960 --> 00:32:01,800
and even looked at the glue, you know.
513
00:32:02,040 --> 00:32:06,400
On an 1858 bottle we found Elmer's glue.
514
00:32:06,480 --> 00:32:10,040
And Elmer's glue didn't come in
until sometime in the '70s.
515
00:32:11,080 --> 00:32:14,560
Here, see if you can spot
the inconsistencies there.
516
00:32:15,400 --> 00:32:20,280
You know, the more we learned,
the larger the epidemic became.
517
00:32:21,160 --> 00:32:25,120
I have over 400 bottles
that are proven fake,
518
00:32:25,320 --> 00:32:27,440
for which I paid $4 million.
519
00:32:29,360 --> 00:32:31,960
I think what spurred Bill on
520
00:32:32,040 --> 00:32:34,520
was when the auction houses told him,
521
00:32:35,880 --> 00:32:39,120
as they say in French, "Tant pis",
you know, "Tough luck, buddy.
522
00:32:39,200 --> 00:32:42,320
"You bought it, you bought it as is,
you're stuck with it."
523
00:32:44,320 --> 00:32:47,440
For some reason, you know,
Freud can answer why,
524
00:32:47,520 --> 00:32:50,240
I just hate being cheated.
525
00:32:52,520 --> 00:32:56,080
In the wine business
there's a code of silence.
526
00:32:57,600 --> 00:32:59,320
I'm not taking this.
527
00:33:02,320 --> 00:33:06,640
We were fairly certain that some of
the wine bottles that Bill had purchased
528
00:33:06,720 --> 00:33:09,920
from Acker Merrall were,
without a doubt, counterfeit.
529
00:33:10,480 --> 00:33:11,960
Let's keep it out of the way.
530
00:33:13,680 --> 00:33:18,520
He tasked me with finding out
the information on this Rudy Kurniawan.
531
00:33:19,640 --> 00:33:23,360
I was given video of Rudy in early 2000
532
00:33:23,440 --> 00:33:27,600
doing what was going to be
a food show on wine.
533
00:33:27,720 --> 00:33:30,320
I almost fell out of my chair
when I first saw these videos.
534
00:33:31,840 --> 00:33:34,120
Dude, I just opened a bottle on Thursday.
535
00:33:35,280 --> 00:33:37,360
Now I feel bad about opening it.
536
00:33:37,760 --> 00:33:39,920
Can I refill it and put the cork back?
537
00:33:41,040 --> 00:33:46,240
The motivation behind the investigator
538
00:33:48,080 --> 00:33:50,920
is to show the elegance of the hustle.
539
00:33:58,800 --> 00:34:03,200
This is the catalogue of the auction
in April 2008 in New York.
540
00:34:03,600 --> 00:34:06,000
The page to present Domain Ponsot.
541
00:34:06,160 --> 00:34:11,960
And when you see the pictures here,
there is a 1929 Clos de la Roche.
542
00:34:12,040 --> 00:34:15,200
Ponsot started estate bottling in 1934.
543
00:34:15,280 --> 00:34:19,760
So, first of all, in the catalogue
it was already wrong and fake.
544
00:34:20,920 --> 00:34:23,320
Everything here also is fake.
545
00:34:23,400 --> 00:34:24,920
This wax we never used.
546
00:34:25,000 --> 00:34:27,280
We never sold any wine to Nicolas.
547
00:34:27,360 --> 00:34:31,760
We never had this vintage printed
outside the label here.
548
00:34:32,200 --> 00:34:34,880
And Clos Saint-Denis, Clos Saint-Denis,
Clos Saint-Denis,
549
00:34:34,960 --> 00:34:38,800
'45, '49, '66, and '71
550
00:34:38,880 --> 00:34:42,520
and we started to produce
the Clos Saint-Denis in 1982. So...
551
00:34:43,520 --> 00:34:47,200
And here you have the 99 points
from the expert.
552
00:34:47,280 --> 00:34:51,960
And the expert is JK.
John Kapon, this is the auctioneer.
553
00:34:53,000 --> 00:34:58,240
So, how can the expert be such
a good expert on wine
554
00:34:58,320 --> 00:35:01,320
which costs $50,000 to $70,000?
555
00:35:02,680 --> 00:35:05,320
Because he earns 20% on it.
556
00:35:09,520 --> 00:35:11,520
When you find a fake wine,
557
00:35:11,600 --> 00:35:17,600
it's a dirt on the integrity of Burgundy
and I wanted to wash it.
558
00:35:21,600 --> 00:35:25,320
So, two days later I jumped into a plane
and I flew to New York.
559
00:35:30,280 --> 00:35:32,840
I wanted John Kapon
to withdraw everything.
560
00:35:33,400 --> 00:35:36,480
The stock market is now down 21%.
561
00:35:37,080 --> 00:35:39,360
Dow traders are standing there
watching in amazement
562
00:35:39,480 --> 00:35:40,840
and I don't blame them.
563
00:35:41,000 --> 00:35:44,160
This could be the most serious recession
in decades
564
00:35:44,240 --> 00:35:46,520
and that means life
as most Americans know it,
565
00:35:46,600 --> 00:35:49,920
is about to change,
in some cases, dramatically.
566
00:35:50,040 --> 00:35:53,600
Bear Stearns had collapsed
the week before the auction.
567
00:35:54,400 --> 00:35:59,440
So, there was some question about,
what was going to happen with the market.
568
00:36:01,880 --> 00:36:04,880
This particular auction
was just a wild affair.
569
00:36:05,640 --> 00:36:09,360
We were all really, really buzzed
on really expensive wine.
570
00:36:16,040 --> 00:36:17,320
Things got so raucous,
571
00:36:17,400 --> 00:36:20,000
halfway through the auction, you know,
Kapon is banging his gavel saying,
572
00:36:20,080 --> 00:36:21,280
"Shut the fuck up, guys."
573
00:36:21,360 --> 00:36:25,680
You know, I mean this is not...
This is not Sotheby's.
574
00:36:28,560 --> 00:36:32,560
7,000, 7,000, 7,000.
575
00:36:32,640 --> 00:36:33,920
I'm looking for 7,500.
576
00:36:34,040 --> 00:36:38,280
I happened to recognise a guy who came in
and sat at the back of the room,
577
00:36:38,400 --> 00:36:40,840
and he was not part of the merriment.
578
00:36:41,440 --> 00:36:43,360
He was sort of like Banquo's ghost.
579
00:36:46,480 --> 00:36:51,560
Suddenly Ponsot stood up,
and there was silence.
580
00:36:52,680 --> 00:36:55,920
He said, "Withdraw my wines",
and everything... John, like,
581
00:36:56,000 --> 00:36:57,880
was at the podium.
582
00:36:57,960 --> 00:36:59,280
It was a bizarre moment.
583
00:37:01,040 --> 00:37:05,040
Kapon announced the entire 30-odd lots
were being withdrawn.
584
00:37:08,720 --> 00:37:10,760
Parcel executed. Do they want two cases?
585
00:37:10,840 --> 00:37:12,960
At the end of the auction I met Kapon
586
00:37:13,040 --> 00:37:16,480
and I was asking who are the owners
of these wines.
587
00:37:20,760 --> 00:37:23,440
The next day I met Rudy Kurniawan
for the first time.
588
00:37:37,120 --> 00:37:38,520
We go to Jean-Georges.
589
00:37:43,080 --> 00:37:45,920
I had no idea of what would happen.
590
00:37:46,000 --> 00:37:48,200
He was just the owner of the wine,
that's it.
591
00:37:51,720 --> 00:37:54,440
My two options was, he didn't know,
592
00:37:54,680 --> 00:37:59,040
or he knew and he wanted to sell it,
and this is not nice.
593
00:38:01,040 --> 00:38:03,080
But that's, that's... No matter what...
594
00:38:03,200 --> 00:38:04,520
After "hello" and so on, I said,
595
00:38:04,600 --> 00:38:08,520
"Look, now, you have to tell me
where the wines are coming from."
596
00:38:10,080 --> 00:38:12,760
He's not going to have food?
597
00:38:13,720 --> 00:38:15,360
You bought these wines, you should know.
598
00:38:16,480 --> 00:38:18,120
I buy a lot of wines and...
599
00:38:18,200 --> 00:38:22,720
"You know, we buy so many wines,
I buy so many wines", said Rudy,
600
00:38:22,800 --> 00:38:25,880
"that I don't know where they come from,
I have to check."
601
00:38:26,440 --> 00:38:28,840
That's why I love wine, you know,
wines, you can never tell.
602
00:38:28,920 --> 00:38:29,960
You can never tell.
603
00:38:30,080 --> 00:38:35,080
I had the idea that Rudy was doing
a lot of dinners and parties,
604
00:38:35,200 --> 00:38:37,400
trying to have every client as a friend.
605
00:38:40,000 --> 00:38:42,520
So, I said to myself,
"I'm going to do the same with him.
606
00:38:42,640 --> 00:38:47,160
"Let him think I will become his best
friend and then he will maybe talk."
607
00:38:49,000 --> 00:38:51,720
We had assembled a team
of international talent
608
00:38:51,840 --> 00:38:54,800
who was actually a former CIA agent.
609
00:38:56,840 --> 00:38:58,280
Sorry, guys.
610
00:38:58,760 --> 00:39:02,800
Percy, you're looking for food,
I got nothing for you.
611
00:39:02,880 --> 00:39:04,720
Percy, get outta here.
612
00:39:05,440 --> 00:39:10,880
We had received some information
about his immigration status.
613
00:39:11,040 --> 00:39:15,200
This is the 2003 US Department of Justice
614
00:39:15,280 --> 00:39:19,000
removal proceedings for Rudy.
615
00:39:20,120 --> 00:39:24,080
He was living in the United States
with a warrant out for his arrest.
616
00:39:26,200 --> 00:39:27,600
Are you going...
Have you done any travelling lately?
617
00:39:27,680 --> 00:39:28,720
No.
618
00:39:28,800 --> 00:39:29,840
-To the wine countries?
-No.
619
00:39:29,920 --> 00:39:30,960
He did.
620
00:39:31,040 --> 00:39:33,840
At that point in time,
his student visa had run
621
00:39:33,960 --> 00:39:37,400
and if he leaves the country,
he'll never get back in.
622
00:39:37,520 --> 00:39:39,000
You're not a big traveller?
You don't like travelling?
623
00:39:39,080 --> 00:39:40,520
I like travelling. I love travelling.
624
00:39:40,600 --> 00:39:42,520
Like putting a sugar addict
in a candy store.
625
00:39:43,920 --> 00:39:46,440
No, I love travelling. I love travelling.
626
00:39:47,800 --> 00:39:51,120
One of the letters to Homeland Security
627
00:39:51,200 --> 00:39:53,960
had the name of the business
628
00:39:54,040 --> 00:39:56,840
that Rudy and his brothers used
629
00:39:57,640 --> 00:40:01,400
to obtain visas to the United States.
630
00:40:01,840 --> 00:40:05,240
We took that letter
and went to this location,
631
00:40:05,320 --> 00:40:08,040
Jalan Gajah Mada plaza.
632
00:40:09,680 --> 00:40:13,080
It's a series of small shops in Jakarta.
633
00:40:13,920 --> 00:40:17,120
One is like a hardware store.
634
00:40:18,400 --> 00:40:19,920
It's like a hardware store.
635
00:40:27,320 --> 00:40:30,560
I have been insisting on emails
and he said,
636
00:40:30,640 --> 00:40:35,040
"Okay, well, I didn't find out yet,
but I promise I will give you that."
637
00:40:35,760 --> 00:40:37,840
A month and a half later
he gave me a name.
638
00:40:38,760 --> 00:40:45,760
"I found out I bought the wines in Jakarta
and it has been sold by a Mr Pak Hendra."
639
00:40:48,080 --> 00:40:49,880
This is the only information he gave me.
640
00:40:53,120 --> 00:40:56,000
I flew to Los Angeles
and I invited him to dinner.
641
00:40:57,600 --> 00:40:59,000
Again, very quickly I ask him,
642
00:40:59,080 --> 00:41:04,120
"Now, Rudy, face to face, eyes into eyes,
tell me the truth.
643
00:41:06,120 --> 00:41:07,480
"Who is this Mr Pak Hendra?"
644
00:41:08,000 --> 00:41:09,640
He's a great guy.
645
00:41:09,960 --> 00:41:11,760
Great... He has a great palate,
646
00:41:12,480 --> 00:41:14,560
been drinking for the last 20, 30 years.
647
00:41:14,680 --> 00:41:19,760
And he took his cell phone and he wrote
two numbers in Jakarta, so I was happy.
648
00:41:24,840 --> 00:41:26,440
Then we had nice dinner.
649
00:41:26,560 --> 00:41:29,160
Great food, great wine, great people,
great ambiance.
650
00:41:29,960 --> 00:41:31,680
Perfect. Can't ask for more.
651
00:41:33,600 --> 00:41:36,600
The next day I tried to call
the two numbers.
652
00:41:40,880 --> 00:41:45,760
One was a fax machine
and the other had no answer at all.
653
00:41:49,960 --> 00:41:54,360
We had heard Rudy had just met
a French vintner
654
00:41:54,440 --> 00:41:59,320
and gave him two phone numbers
and the name of an individual
655
00:41:59,400 --> 00:42:00,680
who was his source.
656
00:42:01,440 --> 00:42:05,560
I immediately had our
former CIA officer run them.
657
00:42:06,480 --> 00:42:10,680
The first number came back to an airline,
Lion Air,
658
00:42:10,760 --> 00:42:13,440
the largest airline of Indonesia.
659
00:42:13,560 --> 00:42:15,720
Not a big wine collector.
660
00:42:16,880 --> 00:42:21,600
And the second number came back
to a strip mall, Jalan Gajah Mada,
661
00:42:21,680 --> 00:42:23,360
and I said...
662
00:42:25,280 --> 00:42:27,200
We knocked on every door,
663
00:42:27,720 --> 00:42:32,440
none of the people in the locations
had ever heard of
664
00:42:32,520 --> 00:42:35,760
Rudy Kurniawan or his father.
665
00:42:36,200 --> 00:42:40,280
Everything with this fellow
just kept coming up fake.
666
00:42:56,680 --> 00:42:59,160
Have you heard about this big wine fraud?
667
00:42:59,640 --> 00:43:02,160
That someone faked wine from these vines?
668
00:43:02,440 --> 00:43:03,480
No.
669
00:43:04,800 --> 00:43:07,680
Someone counterfeited bottles
of Clos de la Roche...
670
00:43:08,520 --> 00:43:10,960
...and then sold them for $20,000.
671
00:43:13,680 --> 00:43:16,240
When I came back to Europe
from this dinner,
672
00:43:16,320 --> 00:43:19,880
it was time to focus on my harvest,
and, you know, I'm a winemaker.
673
00:43:19,960 --> 00:43:22,360
Okay, I don't look like a winemaker,
but I am.
674
00:43:36,120 --> 00:43:39,400
I started to investigate again
at the end of the harvest.
675
00:43:41,280 --> 00:43:47,080
Then I decided to go to Asia, Hong Kong,
Singapore and Taipei.
676
00:43:50,280 --> 00:43:53,160
I wanted to know who is Pak Hendra.
677
00:44:16,080 --> 00:44:19,440
And this one is a roll.
678
00:44:20,040 --> 00:44:22,400
A cheese roll that kind of looks
like a spring roll.
679
00:44:22,880 --> 00:44:27,960
On top we will use a
fresh rosebud for decoration.
680
00:44:28,560 --> 00:44:33,600
When you serve the sauce,
please use the spoon.
681
00:44:33,920 --> 00:44:37,440
You have to put it in the middle
of the plate with the meat.
682
00:44:37,800 --> 00:44:39,960
And let the sauce flow nicely.
683
00:44:45,240 --> 00:44:48,640
I go very often to Asia
and I know very well Asian people
684
00:44:48,760 --> 00:44:51,440
and I have to tell you that
the wealthy people from Jakarta
685
00:44:51,520 --> 00:44:54,040
are coming to Singapore and Taipei
to have fun.
686
00:44:55,480 --> 00:44:58,920
So, I knew a lot of these people
from Jakarta and I would ask,
687
00:44:59,000 --> 00:45:02,320
"Do you know a Mr Pak Hendra?"
688
00:45:02,560 --> 00:45:05,120
Finally I found out that "Pak" means "Mr"
689
00:45:05,200 --> 00:45:07,320
and "Hendra" is like "Smith."
690
00:45:07,400 --> 00:45:11,520
So, this is the most used name
in Indonesia.
691
00:45:16,960 --> 00:45:21,360
So, I would ask, "Do you know a very rich
family importing beer
692
00:45:21,680 --> 00:45:25,800
"that would have a son in California
that would love wine?"
693
00:45:26,560 --> 00:45:28,000
Nobody knew about a family like that.
694
00:45:28,080 --> 00:45:30,920
So, who is Rudy?
695
00:45:34,760 --> 00:45:36,960
No, not at all, he bought them
at a high price.
696
00:45:37,280 --> 00:45:41,320
But he often sells them for a lower price,
the idiot.
697
00:45:41,760 --> 00:45:43,280
He's a good friend then?
698
00:45:43,440 --> 00:45:45,880
I love him!
699
00:45:46,520 --> 00:45:49,400
He didn't talk so much about his wealth,
700
00:45:49,480 --> 00:45:52,560
but he didn't have to
because it was obvious.
701
00:45:52,960 --> 00:45:55,720
I chose this wine tonight
because I have a lot of it.
702
00:45:55,800 --> 00:45:58,040
I wanted to taste it again.
703
00:45:58,360 --> 00:46:02,080
I met his mother, who is a wonderful lady,
and I met his brother.
704
00:46:02,520 --> 00:46:05,600
And your brother, you know,
in the last two months he's been here
705
00:46:05,680 --> 00:46:06,800
eight, 10 times alone.
706
00:46:06,880 --> 00:46:08,320
He doesn't want to go back.
707
00:46:08,800 --> 00:46:10,960
He was very business-like, very nice.
708
00:46:11,040 --> 00:46:14,800
But Rudy was very outgoing
and just the opposite.
709
00:46:14,920 --> 00:46:16,880
I've got to cut down a little bit
710
00:46:16,960 --> 00:46:18,600
on drinking and eating like this
every week.
711
00:46:19,800 --> 00:46:25,040
I spent three Christmases, Christmas Eves
with he and his mother.
712
00:46:26,080 --> 00:46:29,080
She was very old,
she did not speak English
713
00:46:29,160 --> 00:46:31,920
and he was clearly taking care of her.
714
00:46:32,200 --> 00:46:33,840
-We always exchange.
-We always exchange.
715
00:46:35,240 --> 00:46:40,040
Dar seemed very much like the big brother
who was running the business back in Asia
716
00:46:40,120 --> 00:46:42,080
and giving Rudy an allowance.
717
00:46:43,120 --> 00:46:44,960
From my point of view,
718
00:46:45,080 --> 00:46:48,760
he looked up to his brother
and his brother could say,
719
00:46:48,840 --> 00:46:53,680
"Hey, if you screw up,
then I can cut you off."
720
00:46:53,760 --> 00:46:55,600
That's the perception I got.
721
00:46:56,080 --> 00:46:59,320
Dar didn't strike me as a criminal.
722
00:47:00,000 --> 00:47:01,840
What's your favourite Al Pacino movie?
723
00:47:03,600 --> 00:47:04,920
Scarface!
724
00:47:11,480 --> 00:47:15,680
My name is James Wynne.
I was an FBI agent for 30 years,
725
00:47:15,800 --> 00:47:19,200
26 of which were spent investigating cases
726
00:47:19,280 --> 00:47:22,320
involving the theft of art or art fraud.
727
00:47:23,560 --> 00:47:26,040
I've read the Idiot's Book on French Wine.
728
00:47:27,240 --> 00:47:28,960
That's how I started.
729
00:47:30,440 --> 00:47:32,440
My background is financial
730
00:47:32,520 --> 00:47:35,560
and this in a lot of ways
is a financial crimes investigation.
731
00:47:37,880 --> 00:47:42,440
One person described Rudy as having
a never-ending reservoir of needs.
732
00:47:43,600 --> 00:47:47,840
He ran like $16 million
through his American Express account.
733
00:47:47,960 --> 00:47:53,360
Rudy had a number of very nice cars.
An Italian sports car, a Mercedes, SUV.
734
00:47:54,080 --> 00:47:56,920
He had purchased a mansion
in Bel-Air, California.
735
00:47:58,360 --> 00:48:02,920
He was buying contemporary art,
he had a Damien Hirst, he had some Warhol.
736
00:48:03,040 --> 00:48:07,200
All of these trappings
go into creating Rudy.
737
00:48:07,640 --> 00:48:09,800
He was like the Gen X Great Gatsby.
738
00:48:10,560 --> 00:48:13,440
You put me in big trouble, man,
I'm on diet.
739
00:48:13,800 --> 00:48:17,720
The persona established by Rudy
was that he was a trust-fund baby,
740
00:48:17,800 --> 00:48:21,160
very wealthy, sent to the US
to care for his mother.
741
00:48:21,240 --> 00:48:24,640
Was earning an allowance from his brother
who was running the family companies.
742
00:48:26,440 --> 00:48:31,080
I was unable to establish
any of that as being true.
743
00:48:32,560 --> 00:48:34,880
Based on my review
of years of bank records,
744
00:48:34,960 --> 00:48:38,920
I see no evidence whatsoever,
that he was receiving trust-fund proceeds
745
00:48:39,000 --> 00:48:40,040
from his brother.
746
00:48:40,120 --> 00:48:41,760
I always said that, we always said that.
747
00:48:41,840 --> 00:48:44,320
The right wine, the right food.
748
00:48:44,760 --> 00:48:46,040
Let's toast, let's toast.
749
00:48:50,560 --> 00:48:54,360
What emerged for me was
how desperate Rudy was for money.
750
00:48:55,760 --> 00:48:57,840
He's putting people off,
putting people off.
751
00:48:57,920 --> 00:49:00,240
He has a deadline,
he's supposed to pay someone
752
00:49:04,360 --> 00:49:06,880
and he's procrastinating
because he doesn't have the money.
753
00:49:09,440 --> 00:49:10,560
It's almost like a shell game,
754
00:49:10,640 --> 00:49:13,120
he's borrowing money from here
to pay over there.
755
00:49:15,160 --> 00:49:17,640
All the activity involves
wine transactions
756
00:49:17,720 --> 00:49:20,600
and/or loans and advances he was receiving
757
00:49:20,680 --> 00:49:23,080
from clients of one of
the auction companies.
758
00:49:23,800 --> 00:49:25,520
Do you see wine as a good investment?
759
00:49:25,640 --> 00:49:27,080
It's a great investment,
760
00:49:27,200 --> 00:49:29,200
I mean, historically it's been
one of the best investments,
761
00:49:29,280 --> 00:49:31,680
on par with gold and...
762
00:49:32,280 --> 00:49:37,360
Acker, like a lot of auction companies,
offer advances in anticipation of sales.
763
00:49:37,440 --> 00:49:40,520
The beautiful thing about wine
is that people actually drink it,
764
00:49:40,600 --> 00:49:43,880
so there's less bottles every day
or every week
765
00:49:43,960 --> 00:49:45,320
of some of the world's greatest wines.
766
00:49:45,400 --> 00:49:49,520
So, it naturally, kind of, puts pressure
on pricing automatically.
767
00:49:49,680 --> 00:49:52,200
This was a way to beat out
other auction companies
768
00:49:52,280 --> 00:49:54,400
that might be competing
for Rudy's business.
769
00:49:56,920 --> 00:49:59,480
At one point, you know,
Rudy was obligated to Acker
770
00:49:59,560 --> 00:50:01,040
for almost $10 million.
771
00:50:02,000 --> 00:50:03,240
Sir, raise your right hand, please.
772
00:50:03,320 --> 00:50:04,800
Do you promise to tell the truth,
the whole truth
773
00:50:04,880 --> 00:50:07,280
and nothing but the truth,
so help you God?
774
00:50:07,360 --> 00:50:08,400
-I do.
-I do.
775
00:50:08,480 --> 00:50:09,720
Thank you.
776
00:50:10,200 --> 00:50:11,920
Can you please state your name
for the record?
777
00:50:12,000 --> 00:50:13,520
Rudy Kurniawan.
778
00:50:14,480 --> 00:50:17,120
Let me cover some ground rules
just so that you know.
779
00:50:17,200 --> 00:50:19,480
-Have you been deposed before?
-No.
780
00:50:19,640 --> 00:50:21,720
So, it's important that you speak audibly.
781
00:50:21,800 --> 00:50:23,280
Okay, sorry about that.
782
00:50:23,360 --> 00:50:25,640
Because the court reporter's trying
to write down what you're saying,
783
00:50:25,720 --> 00:50:28,800
so he can't write down nods of the head,
he needs words.
784
00:50:28,880 --> 00:50:30,440
-Do you understand that?
-Yes.
785
00:50:39,120 --> 00:50:41,680
Mr Kurniawan, who inspected these bottles?
786
00:50:42,360 --> 00:50:44,320
Well, we basically have...
787
00:50:44,440 --> 00:50:48,840
We basically drank a lot of these bottles
with a lot of different people,
788
00:50:48,920 --> 00:50:52,040
including critics, experts,
789
00:50:52,120 --> 00:50:54,800
auction houses and whatnot.
790
00:50:54,960 --> 00:50:58,240
We tried to press Rudy
for the source of his wine.
791
00:50:59,600 --> 00:51:02,720
We were looking to build our case
and file against him.
792
00:51:03,240 --> 00:51:07,440
John doesn't want to take it,
it could be fake, it could be counterfeit,
793
00:51:07,520 --> 00:51:10,560
but he's not sure, I'm not sure.
794
00:51:10,640 --> 00:51:12,040
I don't believe so.
795
00:51:12,120 --> 00:51:15,960
So, I agreed to take them back,
which is the right thing to do.
796
00:51:16,040 --> 00:51:21,600
He wasn't defensive,
he was guarded but, you know, friendly.
797
00:51:21,680 --> 00:51:24,520
He's a "hail fellow, well met"
kind of fellow.
798
00:51:24,760 --> 00:51:26,520
-Do you speak French?
-No.
799
00:51:27,560 --> 00:51:29,120
-Do you write French?
-No.
800
00:51:29,200 --> 00:51:30,640
Just merci.
801
00:51:33,800 --> 00:51:37,400
Never definitive, nothing concrete.
802
00:51:38,240 --> 00:51:41,760
You know what, that guy, told me nothing.
803
00:51:43,760 --> 00:51:47,600
He owes everybody money,
and John Kapon is no longer,
804
00:51:47,680 --> 00:51:50,200
at least publicly, selling his wine.
805
00:51:50,800 --> 00:51:54,360
And that's when I started to see,
you know,
806
00:51:54,880 --> 00:51:57,960
lists fly across the country
from different brokers and whatnot
807
00:51:58,040 --> 00:52:01,160
because Rudy was trying to find other ways
to sell, and he did.
808
00:52:07,520 --> 00:52:09,240
This is another fake one.
809
00:52:14,360 --> 00:52:17,480
After the Ponsot auction in 2008
810
00:52:17,560 --> 00:52:20,600
nobody wanted to deal with Rudy's wines,
everybody knew there was a problem.
811
00:52:22,480 --> 00:52:27,200
But in 2009, Christie's, of all people,
812
00:52:27,280 --> 00:52:32,040
sold wine for Rudy in a series of auctions
for him under his own name.
813
00:52:33,560 --> 00:52:38,400
You know the auction houses had gone
from having high reputations
814
00:52:38,480 --> 00:52:42,680
to having apparently sold tens of millions
of dollars' worth of counterfeit wines.
815
00:52:44,640 --> 00:52:48,000
In 2012, on top of all this,
816
00:52:48,080 --> 00:52:50,960
I got a hold
of a Spectrum and Vanquish catalogue.
817
00:52:51,880 --> 00:52:54,880
They had brand-new labels,
they had the pink wax.
818
00:52:55,560 --> 00:52:57,240
We all looked at them and all said,
819
00:52:57,320 --> 00:52:59,080
"Yeah, absolutely, this is Rudy's wine."
820
00:53:01,240 --> 00:53:05,080
Spectrum wouldn't withdraw them and they
wouldn't disclose that it was from Rudy.
821
00:53:06,760 --> 00:53:09,840
At that point,
I went and published a warning.
822
00:53:11,840 --> 00:53:13,400
Boy, did this go viral.
823
00:53:15,360 --> 00:53:18,120
There were a number of different
labelling issues
824
00:53:18,200 --> 00:53:20,280
that were basically called
to our attention.
825
00:53:20,360 --> 00:53:24,360
One of them involved a strip label
for an importer, Percy Fox,
826
00:53:24,440 --> 00:53:27,040
that had a misspelling of his address.
827
00:53:27,120 --> 00:53:29,200
Sackvilee street with two "E"'s
828
00:53:29,280 --> 00:53:31,960
and it should have been
with an "L" and an "E".
829
00:53:37,760 --> 00:53:41,760
FBI agents came here
and were talking pretty seriously.
830
00:53:45,240 --> 00:53:48,480
I could tell by their line of questioning
that they were zeroing in on him,
831
00:53:48,560 --> 00:53:50,440
they were serious about it.
832
00:53:50,920 --> 00:53:53,360
I said,
"You're barking up the wrong tree."
833
00:53:53,440 --> 00:53:57,440
Rudy could never do
what you think he has done
834
00:53:57,520 --> 00:54:00,640
because he just doesn't have
the capacity to do it.
835
00:54:03,720 --> 00:54:07,120
And after they left,
I went to the phone and I called him.
836
00:54:07,200 --> 00:54:09,960
As a friend, I thought I should warn him.
837
00:54:10,200 --> 00:54:11,440
I remember his very words.
838
00:54:11,520 --> 00:54:15,440
I said, "The FBI were just here, Rudy,
and I think they're really seriously...
839
00:54:15,520 --> 00:54:16,920
"I can tell,
840
00:54:17,320 --> 00:54:19,440
"the last time they came,
they were just asking.
841
00:54:19,520 --> 00:54:23,080
"This time, there's something serious
going on,
842
00:54:23,440 --> 00:54:24,920
"and I just want to let you know."
843
00:54:25,000 --> 00:54:28,000
And he said, "Don't worry, dude,
I have everything under control."
844
00:54:28,080 --> 00:54:29,120
Those were his very words.
845
00:54:29,200 --> 00:54:32,400
"Don't worry, dude,
I have everything under control."
846
00:54:36,800 --> 00:54:39,920
I don't think there was any reason
to think he knew we were coming.
847
00:54:40,960 --> 00:54:44,760
We meet on the morning of the eighth,
somewhere around 5:00.
848
00:54:45,800 --> 00:54:48,720
The plan was to approach the house,
set up a perimeter,
849
00:54:48,800 --> 00:54:51,280
knock and announce
and place him under arrest.
850
00:54:52,280 --> 00:54:53,680
We pulled up,
851
00:54:53,760 --> 00:54:56,520
agents went to their designated positions,
852
00:54:56,600 --> 00:54:59,240
and they proceeded to knock and announce,
853
00:54:59,320 --> 00:55:02,040
and knock and announce,
and knock and announce,
854
00:55:02,120 --> 00:55:03,480
and yell, and yell,
855
00:55:05,520 --> 00:55:07,240
and there was no answer.
856
00:55:10,240 --> 00:55:12,880
The team leader said, "Get the ram",
857
00:55:12,960 --> 00:55:16,160
and I thought,
"Oh, no, this is going to be a long day".
858
00:55:18,400 --> 00:55:20,160
And then the door opened,
859
00:55:20,240 --> 00:55:21,920
and it was Rudy,
860
00:55:22,920 --> 00:55:25,720
and he looked like
he had just gotten out of bed.
861
00:55:36,200 --> 00:55:38,240
When you walked in the house,
862
00:55:38,320 --> 00:55:40,320
the first thing you saw
was wine everywhere
863
00:55:40,400 --> 00:55:42,840
in the living room
in a huge wine refrigerator.
864
00:55:44,440 --> 00:55:45,720
I was stunned,
865
00:55:45,920 --> 00:55:47,600
I mean, I could've been knocked over
with a feather
866
00:55:47,680 --> 00:55:48,960
when I saw what was in the kitchen.
867
00:55:54,320 --> 00:55:57,640
In the kitchen sink
there were two or three bottles soaking.
868
00:55:58,280 --> 00:56:00,440
The labels were being
soaked off the bottles.
869
00:56:00,880 --> 00:56:03,520
There were two or three bottles
sitting next to the kitchen sink,
870
00:56:03,600 --> 00:56:05,000
waiting to be labelled.
871
00:56:05,440 --> 00:56:09,160
There was a cork extraction device,
there was a re-corking device.
872
00:56:09,800 --> 00:56:11,480
There was in effect a mixing station
873
00:56:11,560 --> 00:56:14,120
of somewhere around 20 bottles
sitting in the kitchen,
874
00:56:14,200 --> 00:56:16,480
all sorts of California wines.
875
00:56:16,880 --> 00:56:18,400
And there were notations.
876
00:56:18,480 --> 00:56:21,920
Change the year, the vintage,
change the size.
877
00:56:22,440 --> 00:56:24,040
Remove a serial number.
878
00:56:24,120 --> 00:56:26,360
We found bottles that were unlabelled
879
00:56:26,440 --> 00:56:29,240
that had handwritten notations,
like formulas.
880
00:56:31,200 --> 00:56:34,040
There were labels and labels and labels,
881
00:56:34,200 --> 00:56:37,560
thousands of labels,
banded like US currency.
882
00:56:39,360 --> 00:56:42,400
The thermostat was set at like 63 degrees,
883
00:56:42,480 --> 00:56:43,760
and in this million-dollar house,
884
00:56:43,840 --> 00:56:46,680
they use space heaters
in the two bedrooms where they slept.
885
00:56:47,280 --> 00:56:49,240
In a store room there were racks
and racks of wine,
886
00:56:49,520 --> 00:56:52,720
and on the treadmill there were 18 waiting
to be labelled.
887
00:56:53,000 --> 00:56:56,120
There was a stencil, there were old
wooden crates throughout the house,
888
00:56:56,280 --> 00:56:59,720
there were boxes with real labels,
like a library.
889
00:57:00,240 --> 00:57:03,760
There was everything you'd ever need
to make fake wine.
890
00:57:05,320 --> 00:57:07,600
As an FBI agent,
if I had listed the 10 things
891
00:57:07,680 --> 00:57:09,840
that I would like to have obtained
from a search,
892
00:57:09,920 --> 00:57:14,240
this was 10 times 10 times 10 times 10
times 10 to infinity.
893
00:57:20,240 --> 00:57:23,120
I don't know
what all that stuff was doing there.
894
00:57:23,200 --> 00:57:24,880
It's very odd, right?
895
00:57:27,440 --> 00:57:29,920
I can't picture...
They didn't find printing presses,
896
00:57:30,000 --> 00:57:31,800
they didn't find... They just found stuff.
897
00:57:32,600 --> 00:57:36,000
They found no stuff to make wax caps,
nothing that...
898
00:57:36,160 --> 00:57:38,680
no means of production, just stuff.
899
00:57:39,280 --> 00:57:40,800
So, what's that stuff doing there?
900
00:57:42,680 --> 00:57:44,520
Is he looking at it,
is he giving it to someone?
901
00:57:44,640 --> 00:57:47,360
Is someone giving it to him to look at?
I don't know.
902
00:57:49,040 --> 00:57:51,040
I could not believe.
903
00:57:51,200 --> 00:57:52,800
I couldn't believe it.
904
00:57:54,480 --> 00:57:56,200
That can't be Rudy.
905
00:58:00,840 --> 00:58:03,880
Being a very close friend of his,
I got calls.
906
00:58:05,080 --> 00:58:07,000
And then I saw the pictures.
907
00:58:10,080 --> 00:58:12,360
He was the last...
908
00:58:12,440 --> 00:58:15,280
He is the last person I would ever suspect
909
00:58:15,360 --> 00:58:19,360
of being able to do
any kind of intensive arts and crafts.
910
00:58:19,520 --> 00:58:21,720
-I left you a message, just so you know.
-No, I didn't get it.
911
00:58:21,800 --> 00:58:24,680
-The number that I have for you, I called.
-It's still there, but I changed...
912
00:58:24,760 --> 00:58:26,240
I just changed to a new phone you see.
913
00:58:26,320 --> 00:58:28,320
He is ADD.
914
00:58:29,200 --> 00:58:31,400
He doesn't have the attention span.
915
00:58:31,720 --> 00:58:33,800
Life is good, life is good.
916
00:58:34,400 --> 00:58:35,720
Life is good, man.
917
00:58:35,800 --> 00:58:39,000
It's a time-consuming,
laborious thing to do and he could...
918
00:58:39,080 --> 00:58:40,640
He could never do that.
919
00:58:40,840 --> 00:58:44,200
I just could not see him doing it,
and still don't see him doing it,
920
00:58:44,360 --> 00:58:46,440
and I still don't believe he did it.
921
00:58:47,000 --> 00:58:48,200
No way.
922
00:59:02,840 --> 00:59:07,200
I think part of
what he started doing was...
923
00:59:10,160 --> 00:59:12,120
Doing some reconditioning.
924
00:59:19,760 --> 00:59:21,520
If you want to take
everything they're saying as true
925
00:59:21,640 --> 00:59:23,720
for the purposes of argument,
and again I'm not stipulating that,
926
00:59:24,560 --> 00:59:26,600
but if you want to take everything
they're saying as true,
927
00:59:28,120 --> 00:59:30,280
we're talking about wine here.
928
00:59:32,240 --> 00:59:34,920
-Oh, my God.
-'91 Ridge Monte Bello.
929
00:59:35,000 --> 00:59:36,080
Don't you want it?
930
00:59:36,160 --> 00:59:39,520
Here's a wine over here,
something that people have tasted,
931
00:59:39,600 --> 00:59:42,000
that they're saying is the best ever.
932
00:59:43,520 --> 00:59:46,600
Well, if you can make something
taste like that,
933
00:59:46,680 --> 00:59:49,560
why not recreate that experience?
934
00:59:50,520 --> 00:59:53,680
And I think that's what happened.
935
00:59:55,200 --> 00:59:58,960
They tried to make that sound
like it was alchemy.
936
00:59:59,040 --> 01:00:02,200
You know, like he was mixing
and matching and contriving.
937
01:00:02,280 --> 01:00:05,120
But that's not what I think it was at all.
938
01:00:05,200 --> 01:00:07,360
I think Rudy just really digs wine.
939
01:00:08,400 --> 01:00:10,600
-This is...
-Where is Rudy?
940
01:00:13,040 --> 01:00:14,680
We're all insecure.
941
01:00:16,040 --> 01:00:18,600
My God, that's it, man.
942
01:00:18,680 --> 01:00:23,160
And if we're the new kid in the group,
we're really insecure.
943
01:00:23,240 --> 01:00:26,400
And especially if everybody else
in the group is older,
944
01:00:26,560 --> 01:00:29,200
if everybody else in the group is richer,
945
01:00:29,280 --> 01:00:32,400
you want to live up
to whatever the expectations are.
946
01:00:33,560 --> 01:00:35,680
The only government evidence
947
01:00:35,760 --> 01:00:38,800
was relating to something
that would have been a couple of bottles
948
01:00:38,880 --> 01:00:44,160
at a time perhaps being made in the
kitchen sink in Rudy's house in Arcadia.
949
01:00:46,440 --> 01:00:50,080
I don't think that you could have created
the number of bottles they claim
950
01:00:50,160 --> 01:00:54,120
that were counterfeit doing that,
so they have a problem with that.
951
01:01:00,240 --> 01:01:01,720
This bottle,
952
01:01:02,440 --> 01:01:05,520
1985 Côte Rôtie La Mouline,
953
01:01:05,800 --> 01:01:07,760
is from the famous...
954
01:01:07,840 --> 01:01:11,040
The famous crazy wine auction.
955
01:01:11,280 --> 01:01:14,600
The Cellar auction where all
the shit happened, Rudy's auction.
956
01:01:14,680 --> 01:01:17,000
The cellar was Rudy's cellar
957
01:01:17,080 --> 01:01:19,600
and you will see this is very real.
958
01:01:20,560 --> 01:01:24,160
So, this is an example of 90%
of Rudy's wine that he sold that is real.
959
01:01:25,760 --> 01:01:28,120
It's fantastic as everyone's going to see.
960
01:01:28,360 --> 01:01:29,760
Yeah, this one is real.
961
01:01:29,840 --> 01:01:33,360
So, he did sell mostly real wine, I think.
962
01:01:33,760 --> 01:01:36,600
He had an incredible palate
and he was also very generous.
963
01:01:36,680 --> 01:01:38,360
Oh, my God, this is so good.
964
01:01:38,440 --> 01:01:39,720
It's rare and perfect.
965
01:01:39,800 --> 01:01:41,240
Do you want to use a fork
'cause it's on camera?
966
01:01:41,320 --> 01:01:43,920
-No, I'm just going to do with my hands.
-Yeah, go for it.
967
01:01:45,640 --> 01:01:47,280
-Let's do it.
-Here we go.
968
01:01:47,360 --> 01:01:48,520
Thank you very much.
969
01:01:48,600 --> 01:01:49,840
Hi, Matthew!
970
01:01:49,920 --> 01:01:51,520
-How are you, babe?
-Everything's good.
971
01:01:51,600 --> 01:01:53,520
-How are those wines?
-Fucking awesome!
972
01:01:53,600 --> 01:01:55,520
Were you just walking down
the street drinking wine?
973
01:01:55,600 --> 01:01:57,880
-No, we took a car here.
-Okay.
974
01:01:57,960 --> 01:02:00,920
We are not able to drive right now,
so we had a driver.
975
01:02:01,280 --> 01:02:05,400
This is one of the wines that Rudy sold.
976
01:02:06,640 --> 01:02:08,240
Try this, please.
977
01:02:17,400 --> 01:02:19,040
It's outstanding.
978
01:02:20,680 --> 01:02:22,760
-It's as good as it gets.
-It does taste really good.
979
01:02:22,840 --> 01:02:24,880
Thank you so much. Christian.
980
01:02:24,960 --> 01:02:28,680
So, this is a bottle
that Levy bought from Rudy.
981
01:02:29,280 --> 01:02:30,600
It's real.
982
01:02:30,800 --> 01:02:33,440
-He bought it from...
-How long has this been open?
983
01:02:33,520 --> 01:02:35,120
About two hours.
984
01:02:41,720 --> 01:02:43,560
-It's garbage.
-You don't like it?
985
01:02:43,640 --> 01:02:45,320
You think it's fake? Really?
986
01:02:45,400 --> 01:02:47,920
I know this wine very well.
It's not even close.
987
01:02:48,000 --> 01:02:50,200
It doesn't have the life,
988
01:02:50,280 --> 01:02:55,400
it doesn't have the verve and the vivacity
and the dimension of a La Mouline '85,
989
01:02:55,480 --> 01:02:59,000
which is almost like,
if you had a really rich
990
01:02:59,080 --> 01:03:02,040
BLT with the egg on top.
991
01:03:02,120 --> 01:03:04,240
That's how that wine tastes almost.
992
01:03:04,320 --> 01:03:05,440
This?
993
01:03:05,680 --> 01:03:08,280
I mean, it tastes like, you know,
skunk juice.
994
01:03:09,680 --> 01:03:11,720
So, that's very interesting.
995
01:03:11,800 --> 01:03:13,880
How much of the Rudy wine do you have?
996
01:03:14,000 --> 01:03:15,400
I don't know.
997
01:03:15,560 --> 01:03:17,000
Six bottles or something.
998
01:03:17,120 --> 01:03:19,280
He has 6,000 bottles.
999
01:03:21,960 --> 01:03:25,800
There is a kind of collaboration
between the forger and the dupe.
1000
01:03:26,000 --> 01:03:27,800
People kind of want to be fooled.
1001
01:03:27,880 --> 01:03:30,640
They really want to own
this very rare bottle of wine
1002
01:03:30,720 --> 01:03:34,440
that maybe doesn't even exist any more
1003
01:03:34,520 --> 01:03:38,280
and so, you don't really want
to know that it's a fake.
1004
01:03:44,360 --> 01:03:46,720
If you believe that Rudy Kurniawan
1005
01:03:46,800 --> 01:03:50,400
was just trying to recondition the bottles
and give them nicer appearance,
1006
01:03:50,480 --> 01:03:52,800
then you probably believe
that in a few weeks
1007
01:03:52,880 --> 01:03:55,400
a man with a white beard is going
to come down your chimney
1008
01:03:55,480 --> 01:03:59,160
and leave a case of 1945 Romanée-Conti
under your tree.
1009
01:04:02,160 --> 01:04:03,920
I became interested in this investigation
1010
01:04:04,000 --> 01:04:07,760
when I met Jim Wynne,
the FBI agent assigned to it.
1011
01:04:08,920 --> 01:04:13,920
I sensed right away that there was going
to be an actual charge that could be made.
1012
01:04:16,200 --> 01:04:18,600
We certainly had overwhelming evidence.
1013
01:04:20,680 --> 01:04:25,240
A connoisseur of counterfeiting,
master of label making, cork stamping...
1014
01:04:26,080 --> 01:04:29,120
He had been purchasing things
like extremely large quantities,
1015
01:04:29,200 --> 01:04:31,360
thousands of dollars, of wax.
1016
01:04:36,040 --> 01:04:39,800
He was ordering paper that was known
for its antique properties
1017
01:04:39,880 --> 01:04:42,480
that can be used to make labels.
1018
01:04:44,240 --> 01:04:48,360
He was collecting dozens and dozens
of empty bottles from restaurants.
1019
01:04:52,560 --> 01:04:55,160
I always keep my empty bottles.
You know that.
1020
01:04:55,240 --> 01:04:56,920
And people ask me why.
1021
01:04:57,000 --> 01:04:59,600
I actually put the date
and the place that I had where,
1022
01:04:59,680 --> 01:05:02,000
you know, and who I had with.
1023
01:05:02,080 --> 01:05:04,200
Kind of simple notes
at the back of the bottle.
1024
01:05:04,280 --> 01:05:08,240
Rudy's explanation was that
he was creating a museum of some kind,
1025
01:05:08,320 --> 01:05:10,280
or he was doing a photo shoot
of some kind.
1026
01:05:18,840 --> 01:05:20,760
He was scanning labels into his computer
1027
01:05:20,840 --> 01:05:24,240
and then he was printing them on a huge
printer that was in the house.
1028
01:05:27,560 --> 01:05:30,320
What I'm doing is forensically
looking at the wines.
1029
01:05:34,160 --> 01:05:36,680
After having scanned through
and catalogued
1030
01:05:36,760 --> 01:05:38,680
all the evidence from Rudy's computers,
1031
01:05:39,200 --> 01:05:41,800
what I can say
is this is definitely Rudy's
1032
01:05:41,880 --> 01:05:43,920
because here's the template that made it.
1033
01:05:53,640 --> 01:05:58,040
There are notebooks upon notebooks
in evidence of Rudy's tasting notes.
1034
01:06:03,360 --> 01:06:07,440
One of the really interesting pieces
of evidence I thought was a half-bottle
1035
01:06:07,520 --> 01:06:09,880
that had writing on it
1036
01:06:09,960 --> 01:06:13,480
and he had M-45 and he had a formula.
1037
01:06:14,120 --> 01:06:16,200
So, that was 1945 Mouton,
1038
01:06:16,560 --> 01:06:20,080
and he had his first formula that he had
blended and he didn't like that.
1039
01:06:20,240 --> 01:06:22,360
He had that scribbled out
and then on the other side
1040
01:06:22,440 --> 01:06:25,680
he had another formula for M-45
that he liked better.
1041
01:06:26,800 --> 01:06:31,440
So, I think that it was a lot of trial
and error and it was a lot of blending.
1042
01:06:32,040 --> 01:06:34,600
He would take these old wines
that he had tasted once.
1043
01:06:34,920 --> 01:06:37,680
He found other wines
that had similar characteristics
1044
01:06:38,080 --> 01:06:39,880
and he'd just mad scientist it.
1045
01:06:41,640 --> 01:06:43,480
What he would make was generally
1046
01:06:43,560 --> 01:06:48,000
a very convincing imitation
of what it said on the label.
1047
01:06:49,240 --> 01:06:52,360
It's easy to dismiss all this and say,
"These guys are sniffing and swirling,
1048
01:06:52,440 --> 01:06:55,280
"and it's all a crock of shit
and you could, you could fool..."
1049
01:06:55,440 --> 01:06:59,120
Well, the fact is most of these guys
you couldn't fool them most of the time.
1050
01:07:00,400 --> 01:07:02,920
That's what's interesting
about Rudy's fraud
1051
01:07:03,120 --> 01:07:05,320
is that hardly anybody could have done it.
1052
01:07:07,480 --> 01:07:09,520
He was a bit of an artist.
1053
01:07:23,800 --> 01:07:27,800
Here this one which is dirty on the side
and not in the middle.
1054
01:07:28,520 --> 01:07:30,920
It was well done, actually,
1055
01:07:31,000 --> 01:07:34,680
but too much well done
because there is nearly
1056
01:07:34,760 --> 01:07:37,200
a line between the dirt and the non-dirt.
1057
01:07:43,880 --> 01:07:45,720
My theory is easy.
1058
01:07:45,880 --> 01:07:48,160
To fake one bottle you need one hour,
1059
01:07:48,400 --> 01:07:50,480
if you have the labels
the wax and everything.
1060
01:07:50,560 --> 01:07:54,640
Just to eliminate the original label,
the capsule,
1061
01:07:54,840 --> 01:07:58,680
and then clean it,
put the new label on it,
1062
01:07:59,040 --> 01:08:02,560
dirt it again, put the wax and everything.
It takes one hour.
1063
01:08:02,920 --> 01:08:05,120
When you know that one of the big sales
1064
01:08:05,200 --> 01:08:07,640
was 15,000 bottles,
or something like that,
1065
01:08:07,720 --> 01:08:11,880
if you multiply the number of bottles
by one hour,
1066
01:08:11,960 --> 01:08:16,080
15,000 hours, so it's impossible.
1067
01:08:16,160 --> 01:08:18,480
I mean, technically, it's impossible
that he could do it...
1068
01:08:18,560 --> 01:08:21,120
He could have done it on his own.
1069
01:08:22,960 --> 01:08:25,960
We know that some of the paper
came from Indonesia.
1070
01:08:26,040 --> 01:08:27,440
His brothers were in Indonesia.
1071
01:08:27,520 --> 01:08:31,520
We knew that there was money going
to his brothers in Indonesia.
1072
01:08:33,200 --> 01:08:38,240
It was pretty evident to us
that this was kind of a family affair.
1073
01:08:38,480 --> 01:08:40,480
-Are you independently wealthy?
-What?
1074
01:08:40,560 --> 01:08:41,920
Are you independently wealthy?
1075
01:08:42,000 --> 01:08:43,680
No, I'm broke, man.
1076
01:08:43,800 --> 01:08:45,280
No, I'm trying...
1077
01:08:45,360 --> 01:08:49,000
I scam people and drink their wines.
1078
01:08:49,080 --> 01:08:52,520
When we spoke to witnesses
and when we conduct our investigation,
1079
01:08:52,600 --> 01:08:54,480
one thing that was pretty consistent was
1080
01:08:54,560 --> 01:08:57,400
that no one really knew
the source of his purported wealth
1081
01:08:57,480 --> 01:09:00,320
and no one actually knew his background.
1082
01:09:00,400 --> 01:09:03,840
His legally registered name
is Rudy Kurniawan,
1083
01:09:03,920 --> 01:09:06,160
but he has operated under different names.
1084
01:09:06,240 --> 01:09:09,160
He operated under the name Lenywati Tan,
or Lenny Tan,
1085
01:09:09,520 --> 01:09:11,720
which is actually his mother's name.
1086
01:09:12,480 --> 01:09:15,480
To answer your question, I come from...
1087
01:09:17,040 --> 01:09:19,400
I come from a wealthy family,
a good family.
1088
01:09:19,480 --> 01:09:20,960
No, that's not what I asked.
1089
01:09:21,040 --> 01:09:25,480
The names for Rudy Kurniawan
and his brother Dar Saputra,
1090
01:09:25,560 --> 01:09:29,120
those are both the names of famous
Indonesian badminton players.
1091
01:09:39,400 --> 01:09:43,360
His father gave him that name
because it is an Indonesian name.
1092
01:09:45,880 --> 01:09:48,960
Rudy was of Chinese descent
1093
01:09:49,040 --> 01:09:52,840
and there was a period of time when
there was a huge amount of even danger
1094
01:09:52,920 --> 01:09:56,520
to people of Chinese descent
that were living in Indonesia.
1095
01:10:01,440 --> 01:10:02,920
The family was reasonably well to do
1096
01:10:03,000 --> 01:10:05,160
and involved in a number
of business interests
1097
01:10:05,240 --> 01:10:07,000
and they've been successful.
1098
01:10:10,440 --> 01:10:15,720
They're fairly reserved in terms
of talking much about the family.
1099
01:10:17,360 --> 01:10:20,240
I come from a wealthy family,
a good family.
1100
01:10:20,320 --> 01:10:23,520
This guy, he's recreating himself.
1101
01:10:26,760 --> 01:10:29,760
It's like he was
in the witness protection programme.
1102
01:10:31,160 --> 01:10:34,960
It's probably going to take him a while
to really taste the wine,
1103
01:10:35,120 --> 01:10:36,800
you know what I mean?
1104
01:10:37,360 --> 01:10:40,760
In Indonesia, everybody is given
an identity card
1105
01:10:40,840 --> 01:10:43,280
and we were able to pull his passports,
1106
01:10:43,360 --> 01:10:48,640
and we knew that his father's name
was Makmur Widjojo
1107
01:10:48,880 --> 01:10:52,640
and that his mother was Lenywati Tan
1108
01:10:52,720 --> 01:10:56,520
and then we knew he had a brother Dar
and he had a brother Teddy.
1109
01:10:57,920 --> 01:11:01,840
Then we were able
to find their Facebook pages.
1110
01:11:01,920 --> 01:11:05,480
They weren't hiding
their conspicuous consumption.
1111
01:11:18,920 --> 01:11:20,440
Who backed him?
1112
01:11:20,840 --> 01:11:23,080
Where did his money come from?
1113
01:11:25,240 --> 01:11:26,840
Who created him?
1114
01:11:27,560 --> 01:11:29,360
Well, you should introduce the menu.
1115
01:11:29,440 --> 01:11:33,120
We started receiving information
through sources
1116
01:11:33,200 --> 01:11:36,440
in the banking community
and in the business community in Jakarta
1117
01:11:36,680 --> 01:11:41,480
that there was a link
between Lenywati Tan's brothers
1118
01:11:41,560 --> 01:11:46,040
being involved in the largest bank heist
1119
01:11:46,280 --> 01:11:48,240
in the history of Jakarta.
1120
01:11:48,320 --> 01:11:53,360
The Supreme Court hasn't been able
to extradite the bank robber Eddy Tansil.
1121
01:11:53,600 --> 01:11:57,280
But there have been
sightings of Eddy in China.
1122
01:11:58,400 --> 01:12:03,520
One of them is Eddy Tansil,
who's still a fugitive in China.
1123
01:12:05,280 --> 01:12:10,440
Eddy broke out of prison and escaped
after stealing all the proceeds of a bank.
1124
01:12:10,960 --> 01:12:13,320
The fugitive misappropriated $565 million
1125
01:12:13,400 --> 01:12:17,000
that he obtained through credits
from Bapindo bank.
1126
01:12:21,760 --> 01:12:25,400
And the other brother, Hendra Rahardja,
had a bank,
1127
01:12:25,480 --> 01:12:30,720
Harapan Santosa, and he walked away
with hundreds of millions of dollars.
1128
01:12:30,800 --> 01:12:33,760
He just stole it
and then fled to Australia.
1129
01:12:34,560 --> 01:12:38,560
Hendra Rahardja is accused
of Indonesia's biggest corporate fraud,
1130
01:12:38,640 --> 01:12:41,440
defrauding $670 million.
1131
01:12:44,800 --> 01:12:49,440
This is really painful you know for us,
for all the clients of the banks.
1132
01:12:49,520 --> 01:12:52,120
I saved my money for about 30 years.
1133
01:12:54,840 --> 01:12:57,920
One of the properties
that Hendra Rahardja
1134
01:12:58,000 --> 01:13:02,200
claimed to own was Jalan Gajah Mada.
1135
01:13:04,200 --> 01:13:06,240
And I was like,
1136
01:13:07,360 --> 01:13:11,320
"The coincidence, is just, you know",
1137
01:13:11,640 --> 01:13:13,480
I don't believe in coincidences.
1138
01:13:14,440 --> 01:13:17,600
Our governments
and the people of Indonesia
1139
01:13:17,680 --> 01:13:21,040
call on all Rahardja's family members
1140
01:13:21,120 --> 01:13:25,920
and associates to come clean
and surrender themselves
1141
01:13:26,000 --> 01:13:29,560
to account for their grotesque crimes.
1142
01:13:30,520 --> 01:13:33,160
Do you have any indication
as to where the money might be?
1143
01:13:33,240 --> 01:13:35,960
Is it in bank accounts
or is it in property or...
1144
01:13:36,040 --> 01:13:38,680
Well, I don't want to signal
our shots in that regard,
1145
01:13:38,760 --> 01:13:40,920
but we do believe
that there are assets overseas.
1146
01:13:50,800 --> 01:13:54,200
I'm going to meet somebody at 12:30
in Westwood, so, I could...
1147
01:13:54,280 --> 01:13:57,960
I don't know if Rudy was benefitting
from Eddy Tansil
1148
01:13:58,040 --> 01:14:00,560
and his mother's family's thievery.
1149
01:14:01,680 --> 01:14:05,320
Maybe that's why
the backstory was created
1150
01:14:05,400 --> 01:14:07,280
when he came to the United States.
1151
01:14:10,400 --> 01:14:14,560
Once this guy was a rock star
in the world of rare expensive wine
1152
01:14:14,880 --> 01:14:18,760
and now Rudy Kurniawan is on trial
for fraud here in New York
1153
01:14:19,440 --> 01:14:23,680
accused of making millions selling
counterfeit wines to unsuspecting...
1154
01:14:23,760 --> 01:14:26,600
I don't want to be away from the trial.
1155
01:14:28,840 --> 01:14:32,120
When Rudy will be in front of me,
eyes into eyes,
1156
01:14:32,200 --> 01:14:36,240
I want to let him know
that I know what he has done
1157
01:14:37,280 --> 01:14:40,800
and it's not a satisfaction
that someone goes to jail.
1158
01:14:41,080 --> 01:14:43,720
But this is so important for Burgundy.
1159
01:14:45,480 --> 01:14:49,040
If Rudy, at the end of the trial, is free,
1160
01:14:49,560 --> 01:14:52,360
I can't believe in anything any more
in life.
1161
01:14:52,440 --> 01:14:54,320
Maybe I will become a monk.
1162
01:14:58,320 --> 01:15:01,040
I'm worried,
I don't know what will happen.
1163
01:15:01,640 --> 01:15:03,400
I am in America, I'm French
1164
01:15:03,480 --> 01:15:06,040
and I have to make my testimony
in English.
1165
01:15:07,320 --> 01:15:09,320
It makes me a little nervous.
1166
01:15:16,760 --> 01:15:18,840
"He turned his home into a wine factory",
1167
01:15:18,920 --> 01:15:21,880
said prosecutor Joseph Facciponti
of the defendant
1168
01:15:21,960 --> 01:15:24,720
and created what he called
his "magic cellar".
1169
01:15:26,480 --> 01:15:28,880
He decided to plead not guilty.
1170
01:15:30,880 --> 01:15:34,360
Sometimes, certainly in the area
of financial fraud,
1171
01:15:34,440 --> 01:15:39,560
there are defendants who basically
don't want to accept reality.
1172
01:15:39,640 --> 01:15:41,720
They choose not to acknowledge it.
1173
01:15:44,720 --> 01:15:48,400
When I got into the room
I found him a little slimmer.
1174
01:15:49,600 --> 01:15:51,880
He lost weight in prison probably.
1175
01:15:53,600 --> 01:15:58,360
It's never something you can like
when you see someone on the ground.
1176
01:16:01,640 --> 01:16:04,240
The Sherlock Holmes of French wine.
1177
01:16:04,320 --> 01:16:07,600
Laurent Ponsot's crusade
to sniff out the fraudster
1178
01:16:07,680 --> 01:16:09,880
who was faking his vintage wines
1179
01:16:09,960 --> 01:16:12,480
began about five years ago and ended here
1180
01:16:12,560 --> 01:16:15,800
at Manhattan's federal district court
this week.
1181
01:16:22,640 --> 01:16:25,680
At a certain point of my testimony,
1182
01:16:25,760 --> 01:16:29,720
our eyes, for once, get in touch,
1183
01:16:29,800 --> 01:16:33,520
and he smiled to me
and he made me a little sign
1184
01:16:33,600 --> 01:16:36,080
with his head and smiled to me.
1185
01:16:40,520 --> 01:16:43,280
I found it bizarre,
but in the meantime nice.
1186
01:16:48,360 --> 01:16:50,800
The first person ever to be convicted
1187
01:16:50,880 --> 01:16:53,120
for selling fake wine in the US
1188
01:16:53,200 --> 01:16:56,800
will spend the next 10 years
bottled up in a jail cell.
1189
01:16:57,520 --> 01:17:03,480
Fraudster Rudy Kurniawan will also pay
$28.4 million back to victims.
1190
01:17:09,640 --> 01:17:12,120
Hi, what's your reaction
to the trial today?
1191
01:17:12,360 --> 01:17:14,720
Very surprised, stunned, I think.
1192
01:17:14,800 --> 01:17:18,320
We did not expect the judge
to impose a sentence of that length.
1193
01:17:18,640 --> 01:17:21,800
Rudy has apologised
to the New York judge saying,
1194
01:17:21,880 --> 01:17:25,040
"Wine became my life
and I lost myself in it",
1195
01:17:25,120 --> 01:17:29,160
an obsession that will be hard
to pursue from behind bars.
1196
01:17:31,600 --> 01:17:35,600
I've had organised crime cases
with dead bodies for less time.
1197
01:17:35,680 --> 01:17:37,200
That's the truth.
1198
01:17:37,280 --> 01:17:39,200
Dead bodies, less time.
1199
01:17:40,560 --> 01:17:44,360
The harm that was actually
done in this case does not justify
1200
01:17:44,440 --> 01:17:46,600
the kind of sentence that was handed out.
1201
01:17:46,680 --> 01:17:47,880
It just doesn't.
1202
01:17:48,400 --> 01:17:51,640
Like he didn't profit from the crime
as much as other people did.
1203
01:17:51,720 --> 01:17:54,800
And the people who profited the most
from his crime
1204
01:17:54,880 --> 01:17:59,320
are living large and drinking great wine
and they're not in jail and...
1205
01:18:00,600 --> 01:18:01,840
Others have suggested
1206
01:18:01,920 --> 01:18:04,880
that there are additional people
that should be prosecuted,
1207
01:18:04,960 --> 01:18:07,360
but to bring a criminal prosecution,
1208
01:18:07,440 --> 01:18:09,880
it's not enough to say
that they were negligent.
1209
01:18:10,280 --> 01:18:12,400
You have to prove they intended
1210
01:18:12,480 --> 01:18:16,480
to defraud someone by lying to them
or making misrepresentations.
1211
01:18:18,240 --> 01:18:19,880
It's kind of like a game of musical chairs
1212
01:18:19,960 --> 01:18:23,600
and Rudy was the last one standing
when the music stopped.
1213
01:18:28,920 --> 01:18:31,640
It is not the real end of the fakers.
1214
01:18:32,200 --> 01:18:37,040
If I go on investigating,
I will find more people doing this,
1215
01:18:37,120 --> 01:18:39,200
but I'm going to stop.
1216
01:18:39,960 --> 01:18:44,120
I want to focus again on my job
to produce authentic wines.
1217
01:18:57,600 --> 01:19:01,480
We're gathered tonight to play
the final note in a symphony...
1218
01:19:01,680 --> 01:19:03,920
...of which I am honoured
to be the conductor.
1219
01:19:04,880 --> 01:19:07,400
But a conductor is nothing
without his musicians.
1220
01:19:07,920 --> 01:19:11,760
Each one of you has picked
the equivalent of two thousand bottles.
1221
01:19:15,360 --> 01:19:18,040
Thank you for your patience,
your work and your joie de vivre...
1222
01:19:19,080 --> 01:19:21,840
because together we have played music
both harmonious and refined.
1223
01:19:46,920 --> 01:19:50,520
This is the largest wine seizure
the US Marshals ever handled.
1224
01:19:50,880 --> 01:19:52,520
Behind you we have over 500 bottles
1225
01:19:52,600 --> 01:19:56,680
that have been deemed counterfeit
from Rudy Kurniawan's private collection.
1226
01:20:02,880 --> 01:20:07,040
I have no doubt that it's going
to take years or decades or maybe never
1227
01:20:07,120 --> 01:20:10,080
to fully filter out
all of Rudy Kurniawan's fake wines.
1228
01:20:16,160 --> 01:20:20,640
It's impossible to identify every single
person who has one of those bottles.
1229
01:20:21,400 --> 01:20:22,800
It's broken!
1230
01:20:27,760 --> 01:20:31,120
You know, more scrupulous collectors
have just bitten the bullet
1231
01:20:31,200 --> 01:20:33,000
and they've written off a bunch of stuff.
1232
01:20:33,080 --> 01:20:37,440
John Kapon, to his credit has, you know,
anything questionable
1233
01:20:37,520 --> 01:20:40,800
he has taken back and he's refunded
a lot of people's money.
1234
01:20:40,880 --> 01:20:42,520
All right. Good.
1235
01:20:42,720 --> 01:20:44,720
But I think a lot of people probably
don't want to know
1236
01:20:44,800 --> 01:20:46,840
that their cellars are full of fakes.
1237
01:20:46,920 --> 01:20:49,760
So, they're just...
It's still out there, you know.
1238
01:20:50,040 --> 01:20:53,960
For the best of Chile and Argentina
and the rest... 160!
1239
01:20:54,720 --> 01:20:56,280
They'll circulate.
1240
01:20:57,040 --> 01:21:00,160
If you buy this,
you will almost certainly get laid.
1241
01:21:00,240 --> 01:21:01,400
All right!
1242
01:21:01,480 --> 01:21:04,160
You're going to start me, sir,
but at what price?
1243
01:21:04,240 --> 01:21:05,280
$10,000!
1244
01:21:05,360 --> 01:21:07,160
I don't look at wine catalogues any more.
1245
01:21:08,520 --> 01:21:10,200
I throw them in the wastebasket.
1246
01:21:10,800 --> 01:21:12,760
$200,000!
1247
01:21:12,840 --> 01:21:18,040
This whole industry has a pomp
and circumstance to it.
1248
01:21:19,800 --> 01:21:23,120
You're either a believer or an apostate.
1249
01:21:28,840 --> 01:21:30,280
Cheers, guys!
1250
01:21:32,040 --> 01:21:34,720
Want some beer? You want some beer?
1251
01:21:36,840 --> 01:21:39,760
Like, dare you say
the emperor has no clothes?
1252
01:21:43,120 --> 01:21:45,040
It's just liquid, it's wine.
1253
01:21:45,240 --> 01:21:47,400
But it's become a commodity.
1254
01:21:52,160 --> 01:21:56,000
Some of the biggest CEOs
of corporate America...
1255
01:21:57,240 --> 01:22:00,280
They all were duped by this guy.
1256
01:22:02,600 --> 01:22:06,080
The moral to this story
in my opinion is that
1257
01:22:06,160 --> 01:22:08,880
when you leave things unregulated,
1258
01:22:09,160 --> 01:22:11,360
you allow the wolves to come in
1259
01:22:11,440 --> 01:22:14,920
and game the system
and this system had been gamed.
1260
01:22:17,920 --> 01:22:21,440
When I first discovered this case of wine
that he sold me was fake,
1261
01:22:21,520 --> 01:22:24,600
I was very hurt
and I felt like a fool, too.
1262
01:22:25,080 --> 01:22:26,800
I felt foolish,
1263
01:22:26,880 --> 01:22:31,920
but the number of amazing experiences
I had with him,
1264
01:22:32,000 --> 01:22:34,840
far outweigh any anger I could have.
1265
01:22:36,120 --> 01:22:39,320
So, I forgave, you know. I forgave that.
1266
01:22:46,920 --> 01:22:50,280
When I think about him
and I think about him quite a bit,
1267
01:22:50,360 --> 01:22:53,960
I just cannot put two and two together.
1268
01:22:54,040 --> 01:22:56,600
I just can't because it's like talking
1269
01:22:58,360 --> 01:22:59,840
about black and white.
1270
01:23:01,320 --> 01:23:02,480
Vincent!
1271
01:23:02,960 --> 01:23:06,080
I have not tried,
but I would love to see him.
1272
01:23:07,320 --> 01:23:11,120
One day, I hope,
I'll be able to sit down with him.
1273
01:23:11,720 --> 01:23:15,720
I don't know. I'll just tell him,
"What was this all about?"
107145
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