• A hundred gendarmes arrested on Monday in the Médoc and in seven departments around twenty people suspected of having organized large-scale wine trafficking.

  • The owner of a vineyard in the Médoc, also a merchant, obtained wine through “Spanish contacts” and printed “a large number of labels” in complete discretion.

  • The instigator, with the help of three accomplices, had also “developed a network of official and unofficial distributors made up of companies, retirees, autoentrepreneurs, spanning several departments.

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Trafficking in counterfeit Bordeaux estimated at "several hundred thousand bottles", according to the public prosecutor Frédérique Porterie.

The gendarmerie carried out a crackdown on Monday against a counterfeiting network that sold low-end wine by passing it off as Bordeaux.

A hundred gendarmes arrested Monday in the Médoc (Gironde) and in seven departments around twenty people suspected of having taken part in this traffic.

Three of these suspects, including the "main instigator", were presented on Wednesday before an examining magistrate and indicted for "organized gang fraud and money laundering", "deception on the goods" and "falsification of foodstuffs".

They were released under judicial supervision with an obligation to pay bail of 20,000 to 50,000 euros.

A fraud "organized by the owner of a vineyard in the Médoc"

While investigating drug trafficking, the gendarmes accidentally came across counterfeit material last September, such as "false labels", detailed the prosecution.

Then in October, false Bordeaux were spotted in the La Flèche sector (Sarthe).

Facts that resonated with the report made a few months earlier by the owner of a château in the Médoc who had noticed a counterfeit of his wine and had reported these facts to the gendarmes. 

The prosecution opened an investigation in November entrusted to the research section with the support of the gendarmes of the Gironde and the "wine" group, a specialized cell of the gendarmerie of New Aquitaine.

The investigations revealed "a large-scale fraud organized by the owner of a vineyard in the Médoc", also a merchant.

The latter obtained wine through “Spanish contacts” and printed “a large number of labels” discreetly while bottling operations could take place at night.

The counterfeit targeted mid-range Médoc wines

The instigator, with the help of three accomplices, had also “developed a network of official and unofficial distributors made up of companies, retirees, autoentrepreneurs, spanning several departments.

“The fake Bordeaux wines were then sold” in whole pallets “in several departments thanks to” a network of official and unofficial distributors made up of companies, retirees, autoentrepreneurs”, according to the prosecution.

Thus, "customers or consumers thought they were buying Bordeaux châteaux whose name and label inspired confidence at prices that sometimes defied all competition when in reality they were buying low-end wines or wines from quite distant regions. ” emphasizes the prosecution.

“Large orders”, i.e. several thousand bottles, were also “intended for mass distribution or foreign countries”.

According to a source close to the case, the counterfeiting targeted mid-range Médoc wines, which are easier to falsify than the great wines.

“If the facts are proven, we hope that the perpetrators will be heavily condemned because these practices damage the image of Bordeaux wines and the image of all those who work well and respect the rules”, reacted the Interprofessional Council Bordeaux wine attached, by AFP.

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