The Rudy Effect -- by Nicholas Silvers

I write this as an Op-Ed piece and nothing else. I do find it important for those of us involved in any way in the fine wine trade to speak up regarding the recent arrest of Rudy Kurniawan and how we see this overall affecting the wine world overall. Like many, I have been around long enough in the wine world to see the emergence, rise and presumably fall of Rudy. I have been asked on many occasions, on many continents and from buyers and sellers about him and my thoughts. I have never gone on the record (though I have been asked to by members of the press), but as recent events show, my off-the-record opinions proved to be true. I did not deal with Rudy on the buy side and only sold to him once (a personal 6L bottle of 2001 DRC Romanee St Vivant) back in 2005 or 2006. I have had dinner with him (along with others) on several occasions as well as engaged in a little bit of general chit chat when we bumped into each other at wine events, but that was the limit of our acquaintance. It became very obvious to me that the amount of allegedly (now proven) fake wines that were hitting the market coincided with his ascent in the wine world. The more fake wines that showed up, the less he would turn up at events I would previously see him at and my suspicions grew. As private clients begun to ask about whether they should purchase certain wines from a dealer or more often an auction house, my advice in most cases was not to do so. I never said anything was real or fake but simply that provenance raised the wines of interest into question. If they asked about their being Rudy wines directly, I did not comment as I was not privy to that information, but suggested erring on the side of caution given the financial commitment.
 

Ultimately, I find what Rudy (whether alone or not) did to the business reprehensible. We have only dealt in older wines when provenance was documented and provable but I have intentionally stayed away from pre-1980 wines in general as I waited for this particular shoe to drop. In the interim I had been called crazy, a conspiracy theorist, or in general unknowledgeable about matters of older wines. The day Rudy was arrested I was finally able to return those comments. I am not an investigator nor did I have any specific information, but I am a very good judge of character and pride my ability to read people. While I very much enjoyed some of the great wines poured when Rudy was around, I did not get blinded by the excitment of it all and look past the obvious. When friends of mine in the trade were asking if I had seen Rudy lately, I would ask why? They all had a common answer: he owed them money. Some people said he had give two or three different credit cards that were all declined. These were all additional signs of the inevitable.
 

I want to give Bill Koch a lot of credit here. His crusade to clean up the fraudulent wine activity has ultimately helped to get to this point. Admittedly, a lot of people along the way are less keen on his efforts as they may have been run through whether they were knowingly selling fraudulent wine or not, but in the end, one of the key culprits has been arrested with evidence and this is a very good thing for us as collectors and merchants.
 

The future...Well, we will see. I feel for some friends in the business that are honest and deal in older wines as it is likely a lot of older wines will now be called into question though hopefully not their reputations. For those that deal in younger wines, it should be good because those of us who can account for provenance and travel the globe to meet their clients face to face, those reputations should be stronger than ever. It has always been a simple rule in life for me in anything I did business or personal: Know who you're dealing with!  I made the mistake once in buying wine as a collector and was defrauded by Ron Wallace of Rare LLC (arrested and imprisoned courtesy of the FBI). Maybe he and Rudy can share a cell. As far as I am concerned, thieves are not far from rapists so I hold no sympathy for either of these men. They knew exactly what they were doing and did it with no regard for honest people and how it would affect their lives or businesses.

The wine business will go on as it always has. There will be another Ron Wallace or another Rudy Kurniawan, but for now we can be thankful another alleged crook has been removed from the cycle. I can of course only speak for myself and the companies associated with me but from the standpoint of SC Trading and Pockets Wine, we are extremely pleased with the efforts of all of those involved to get this result and are as always happy to hear feedback from our clients, colleagues and those interested in doing business with us.