Court convicts 12 in Pinot Noir fraud scheme

By JOHANNA DECORSE, Associated Press Writer

TOULOUSE, France (AP) -- A French court has convicted a dozen people, from wine growers to a wine merchant, in a scheme that exported fake Pinot Noir from southwestern France to the United States, duping California-based giant E. & J. Gallo Winery among others.

A French merchant with a key role in the affair said Thursday that he may appeal, claiming that his wine is "irreproachable."

Claude Courset of the Ducasse company received the harshest sentence from the court in the city of Carcassonne, a six-month suspended prison sentence and a euro45,000 ($61,000) fine. The company that sold Ducasse's wine in the United States, Sieur d'Argues, was convicted of fraud and fined euro180,000 ($244,000).

Eight vintners and wine cooperatives in the Languedoc-Roussillon region, charged with deception and forgery, were given sentences ranging from a month suspended prison to fines of euro40,000 ($54,000).

The southern Languedoc-Roussillon is not known for its production of Pinot Noir, a thin-skinned grape mainly associated with the Burgundy region.

The Carcassonne court described the fraud as "organized and structured."

Prosecutor Francis Battut said in a telephone interview Thursday that Merlot and Syrah grapes were passed off as Pinot Noir in a scheme dating from January 2006 to March 2008.

A spokeswoman for Gallo, a veritable winemaking empire in the San Joaquin Valley, said the company is "deeply disappointed" that its supplier, Sieur d'Arques, was found guilty, adding that Gallo is no longer selling that wine to customers.

Gallo officials said Wednesday that the only French Pinot Noir that was potentially misrepresented to Gallo was the 2006 vintage.

Courset, whose company Ducasse dealt with Sieur d'Arques for the export of the wine, said he "reserves the right to appeal" the court decision.

"We scrupulously respected the contract terms of our client," he told The Associated Press. "Our wines are irreproachable."

He has contended that the investigation went off course, concentrating on the wine growing situation in general amid the global economic crisis "but also with obscure regulations that fluctuate from country to country."

Prosecutor Battut, speaking by telephone, said wine cooperatives sold "local wine to Ducasse labeled Pinot at his request and modifying accompanying documents and bills."
He labeled the case a "very important fraud."