From 2011 to 2013 he managed to market, selling it as Brunello and Rosso di Montalcino wine, an enormous quantity of wine of modest quality. He is a technical consultant for various wine-producing farms in the Montalcino area, victims of fraud, who was assisted by collaborators in various capacities and with different functions within the entire chain of production and sale of grapes and wine, being identified.
He is about to end up run over, his mother saves him
From 2011 to 2013 he managed to market, passing it off as Brunello and Rosso di Montalcino wine, a huge quantity of wine of modest quality. He is a technical consultant for various wine producing farms in the Montalcino area, victims of fraud, who was assisted by collaborators in various capacities and with different functions within the entire chain of production and sale of grapes and wine , being identified.
The professional, abusing the working relationship and the trust he had now gained, also by virtue of demonstrated high professional skills, took possession of documentation and genuine material certifying the DOCG (state stamps, transport documents, invoices etc.), reproducing them in an artificial way.
Accounting documents allowed him to accompany consignments of common grapes and wine - purchased, presumably in black - which he sold to cellars during the harvest and aging phase, while the markings would have allowed him, instead, to “dress” as Brunello - in a perfect and impossible to discover way - bottles of any red wine.
But thanks to one reporting by the Consortium of Brunello di Montalcino Wine, the Public Prosecutor's Office and the Sienese Guardia di Finanza have discovered the sensational fraud damaging the image of one of the most famous national DOCGs in the world. A part of the wine seized as a result of the delegated searches was still in the barrel aging phase: in those cases the buyer would have kept that product for years, convinced of obtaining an excellent product at the end of the cycle envisaged by the specification.
The mechanism was ineffable thanks to extraordinary computer skills of the subject, which has even managed to insert falsified data in the ARTEA database of the Tuscany Region (Tuscany Regional Agency for Agricultural Disbursements), creating perfect correspondence between the mendacious administrative documentation and the telematic data that can be consulted by the supervisory bodies.
From the investigations - delegated by Rep. Prosecutor of Siena dott. Aldo Natalini to the employee of the Tax Police Unit of the capital - it emerged in fact that the skilled scammer had performed repeated telematic accesses to the aforementioned ARTEA computer system, falsifying the data of the declarations of production of the harvests, of the accounting stocks and of the sales of bulk wine.
The investigations carried out so far have made it possible to find, following multiple searches, and subject to evidential seizure 165.467 liters of wine - equal to approximately nr. 220.600 bottles of 0,75 cl format. - of which 75.620 liters of Brunello di Montalcino and 89.847 liters of Rosso di Montalcino, for a value of at least one million euros, and also 2.350 state marks and copious documentation and counterfeit material.
The consultant was charged with commercial fraud, abusive access to a computer system, aggravated and continued embezzlement and forgery offenses. Investigations are still underway to better define the evidential framework and the network of co-responsibility of any other parties involved and have contributed to protect the consumer when purchasing the product and to guarantee, at the same time, the transparency of the wine market, a sector of primary importance for the national economy and the image of “Made in Italy”.
“We have the right means to defend our products of excellence - said Minister Maurizio Martina - and today's operation of the Guardia di Finanza in collaboration with our Inspectorate for the repression of fraud confirms this. The contrasting action put in place testifies that the levels of quality control are there and they work. Indeed, the operational synergy between the control bodies and the certification bodies made it possible to prevent fraud from still affecting consumers and to put an end to hateful unfair competition against honest producers. Anyone who wants to operate outside the rules must be put out of the game and for this reason I consider the example set by the Brunello Consortium to be important in denouncing suspicious movements ”.
Roberta Ragni
