Don, now that you post a link to it, I do remember seeing it.
Unfortunately, this topic is so broad, it’s hard to keep up!
It’s a town in Sicily semi famous as the birthplace of Cinema Paradiso director Giuseppe Tornatore. And the Targa Florio open road race used to go there.
according to the press release Baghera had the wines checked by drc and drc is happy with them:
As we say in New York, that and $2.75 will get you a subway ride . The claim has been made before by auction houses and has been proved false. Don can chime in with more specific knowledge, but I would not rely on something in a press release.
Since you joined and only posted this shortly after, do you have any affiliation at all, or are friends with anyone related to the auction house or the wines. Or in any other way, however remote, to them?
Maybe this person?
Note that the press release only states that the wines “sold” at auction were checked, it says nothing about the wines which were withdrawn. Then makes some pretty low comments about the “real connoisseurs” not being mistaken about provenance. I guess Don Cornwell isn’t a “real connoisseur.” Who knew?
From the DB article : “Domaine de la Romanée-Conti examined every single bottle sold last Sunday…”
-Did the domaine also see/check the not sold, withdrawn lots ?
-And was the 1919 Rousseau Chamb. lot, really sold, and at what price ?
-Soren.
DRC does never “authenticate” wines for an auction.
This is my information from the top people there and I do not doubt them.
Paper is durable…
Thank you Don!
Or are you in any other way “in the business”? A quick google search indicates that there is a Marc Fischer that is the head of Steinfel’s Wine Auction House in Zurich, Switzerland.
First moral of wine auctions
Do not cross the berserkers !! you guys are brutal in isolating the details. Of course i agree 100% and these people ripping us off deserve to be exposed.
What I keep wondering is not only WHICH wines were pulled from the auction (and by all accounts the 1961 Petrus was not among them—how much could it have possibly brought?), but WHAT HAPPENS to the wines that were pulled from auction. Will they be sent back to the Noble Cru folks for sale elsewhere, or will they be destroyed (or at least drunk for the fun of it)? And what happened to the results of the Auction? Will those ever be posted? Or shall I continue my pursuit of unicorns as a pastime instead of continuing to focus attention on the outcome of this weird auction.
Since Baghera apparently doesn’t want to admit which lots were withdrawn, I will tell everyone. Baghera withdrew the following lots immediately before the sale, all of which were discussed in this thread:
Lot 1- Mixed 1978 DRC wines, including the 1978 Romanee Conti with embossed glass (vintage 1974 bottle)
Lot 59 - 1952 Romanee Conti
Lot 61 - 1962 Romanee Conti
Lot 63 - 1978 Romanee Conti with embossed glass (vintage 1974 bottle)
Lot 65 - 1980 Romanee Conti magnum
Lot 66 - 1980 Romanee Conti magnum
While I don’t have a results sheet, apparently, all of the other problematic lots discussed in this thread were sold.
DRC did inspect the DRC wines that were sold by Baghera after the auction. In the process of doing that they found one additional lot of DRC wines which was suspect and the sale was cancelled by Baghera. I do not know that particular lot number at this juncture.
According to Aubert de Villaine, DRC inspected the wines at the request of Baghera for two reasons: (1) the controversy surrounding the DRC wines based on my post and (2) Baghera had represented in the catalog and pre-auction publicity, based on representations made to them by their consignor, “that we [DRC] had checked ‘all the bottles’ that were offered, which was wrong, we had checked a few of them only.”
As noted previously, the DRC wines and other burgundies came from Nobles Crus, the failed Luxembourg wine investment fund. This was verified by two sources, including a major auction house that was offered the same set of wines. Nobles Crus bought collectible wines for its wine fund from all over the world. The reason that DRC had previously inspected some of these wines was because it came to light that Nobles Crus had a large stock of counterfeit 2009 DRC assortment cases that had been offered for sale. DRC inspected the 2009 assortments on site and multiple counterfeit cases were removed by agreement with DRC.
The fact that the wines did not come from a single Swiss collector as claimed is also obvious from a careful reading of the catalog – there were very few lots containing OWCs, very few lots from Swiss sources, and the composition of the various pseudo-assortment lots indicated that there was no way these wines were assembled by a single private collector as claimed.
Of the 266 DRC lots from the alleged single Swiss collector which were allegedly stored for many years at Geneva Free Port, only 15 lots contained bottles with Swiss importer back labels (see Lots 29, 50, 53, 57, 80, 83, 85, 94, 96, 129, 131, 132, 145, 213 and 258.) But there were many, many back labels from Italy and the United States. In the case of the 1978 DRC vintage, this collection included wines with front-of-the-bottle import strip labels from three different US importers (see Lots 1, 119, 122, 192, 194 and 230.) In the 1985 vintage, there were bottles from both US importers (see lots 123, 169, 220 and 231.)
There were various bottles (mostly single bottles) from all over the rest of Europe, including Belgium (Lots 44, 55, 56, 109, 164, 229, 240, 257 and 262), Luxembourg (Lots 55 and 58), Germany (Lots 52, 111, 148, 149, 163, 165, 213 and 217), the UK (Lots 57, 141, 142, 147, 179, 221, 228 and 237), Spain (Lot 206) and Austria (Lots 38, 50 and 107). There were also bottles with no back labels, sometimes with Leroy strips and sometimes without, which were presumably from France.
But the lots I found most interesting included wines, usually single bottles, that had DRC importer back labels from Australia (Lots 47, 104, 144), New Zealand (Lot 26), Japan (Lot 202) and Israel (Lot 110.) Our allegedly intrepid Swiss DRC collector seems to have had disdain for purchasing DRC wines sourced in his own country, but unlike many other European collectors, wasn’t hesitant to buy bottles from the US, and also wasn’t hesitant to buy single bottles of DRC wine from the great majority of other countries around the world where the wines are sold.
Given the problems that arose in this auction, and the complete misrepresentation as to the provenance of the wines offered, my colleagues and I have gone back for a look at Baghera’s initial auction in December 2015. I anticipate additional developments.
Well, if a domaine inspects an obviously false bottle, they do not return the bottle(s) - it would be interesting to know if that was the case here eh?!
That would be Bagheria 
Is Swiss law pertaining to auctions as tough as some other elements of the Swiss penal code? For instance, I know that traffic laws are maniacally enforced, as is cross-border importation of wine above the personal allotment. If so, I’d sure hate to be on the receiving end of an investigation
Thank you Don, for your brilliant analysis. You are the definition of a Connoisseur.
Don saying, “I anticipate additional developments” should strike the same note of dread in a crook’s heart as
Statement sent out by email today by Baghera (my bold):
‘Preserved in Geneva’s Free Port for several years, this collection of over 1,400 bottles of Domaine de la Romanée-Conti wines is the most significant range of DRC offered at auction in the past 2 decades. Exceptionally, considering the eminence of the collection and with a view to guarantee our clients’ full peace of mind, the Domaine de la Romanée-Conti examined every single bottle sold on Sunday 22nd of May. This unprecedented action emanating from the Domaine de la Romanée-Conti as concerns bottles offered at auction, corroborated and endorsed Baghera Wines’ initial expertise and methodological approach.’
Bravo!