15 Facts About Rudy Kurniawan

Rudy Kurniawan was born on Zhen Wang Huang; 10 October 1976 and is an Indonesian convicted criminal and perpetrator of wine fraud.

Rudy Kurniawan was found to be offering more magnums of the limited edition 1947 Chateau Lafleur than had been produced, and his Clos Saint-Denis Grand Cru was labelled with a fictitious vintage.

Rudy Kurniawan unsuccessfully sought political asylum in the United States in 2001.

Rudy Kurniawan was directed to leave the country no later than April 25,2003; instead, he elected to stay in the United States illegally.

Rudy Kurniawan began buying and selling large amounts of rare wines in the early part of the 2000s, spending as much as $1 million a month buying auction lots by 2006.

At the 2007 TASTE3 food and wine conference held in Napa, California, David Molyneux-Berry, the former head of the wine department at Sotheby's, noted that only five magnums of the 1947 Lafleur were produced, indicating that Rudy Kurniawan's wines sold in 2006 were assuredly fakes.

In 2008, Rudy Kurniawan consigned several bottles allegedly made by Domaine Ponsot from the Clos Saint-Denis Grand cru appellation, with vintages ranging from 1945 through 1971.

Ponsot later met with Kurniawan and was left wondering if Rudy was actually a counterfeiter or simply the last person to innocently handle counterfeited wine.

Bill Koch filed a lawsuit against him in 2009, alleging Rudy Kurniawan knowingly sold fake bottles to him and other collectors, both at auction and privately.

Later investigations indicated that Rudy Kurniawan was purchasing inexpensive, though old, Burgundy wines and re-labeling them with prestigious producer names and vintages.

Rudy Kurniawan's trial began on 9 December 2013, and concluded on 18 December 2013, when the jury found him guilty.

Rudy Kurniawan was then handed over to the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement for deportation to Indonesia.

Rudy Kurniawan had been living in the United States illegally since 2003, and under the terms of his sentence he was to be deported upon his release.

Rudy Kurniawan was formally deported on April 8,2021; he returned to Indonesia the next day.

Koch and Rudy Kurniawan settled out of court in July 2014 for $3 million in damages, and Rudy Kurniawan should be completely debriefed regarding his knowledge of counterfeiting in the wine industry.