A month in wine
FRENCh ANTi-FRAuD oFFiCiAls have revealed that they seized millions of bottles-worth of wine falsely labelled with popular Rhône appellations, including Châteauneuf-du-Pape, as part of an investigation begun in 2017.
The three-year fraud operation, allegedly run by the head of a single merchant house in southern France, produced enough wine to fill 13 olympic swimming pools, said France’s consumer protection and fraud office, the DGCCRF, in its annual report on investigations conducted in 2017.
The report states that between october 2013 and June 2016, about 200,000 hectolitres of wine with no designation of origin (iGP) had been wrongly labelled as Côtes du Rhône and Côtes du Rhône Villages.
of that, 10,000 hectolitres – the equivalent of 1.3 million bottles – had been unlawfully labelled as Châteauneuf-du-Pape. The true origin of the wine used was not specified.
The DGCCRF said that the CEo of an ‘important’ merchant house had been arrested, charged and released on bail set at
million. The individual was also suspended from working at the company.
Although the DGCCRF did not name the company or individual involved, widespread media reports over the past few months point to bulk wine merchant Raphaël Michel and its CEo at the time, Guillaume Ryckwaert.
lawyers for both Ryckwaert and Raphaël Michel have previously denied any wrongdoing when questioned by French media.
key regional trade bodies interRhône and the uMVR, a merchant union, have said they intend to join the prosecution as civil parties, according to DGCCRF. le syndicat des Vignerons des Côtes du Rhône told Decanter last year that it had already joined the case as a civil party.