Posted on 05/22/2019 12:19:45 PM PDT by LibWhacker
Federal prison is getting another enophile.
The owner of Safe Harbour Wine Storage in the Baltimore suburb of Glen Burnie pled guilty in federal court on Tuesday to selling his customers' wine and pocketing the money, and is expected to serve 18 months in federal prison.
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William "Billy" Holder, 54, was originally charged with five counts of wire fraud and five counts of interstate transportation of stolen goods. He reached a plea agreement for one wire fraud count, admitting that he faxed a purchase agreement in June 2017 to sell 216 bottles of wine to a broker in Napa for $11,800.
This was a fraction of the amount of wine Holder admitted stealing. The indictment claimed Holder stole $2.3 million worth of wine; in the plea agreement, that figure is crossed out and Holder agreed that "Safe Harbour customers lost between $550,000 and $1.5 million worth of wine". The numbers are written in pen on a typewritten agreement. Holder has agreed to pay restitution of that amount.
A Washington DC man, Todd Laubach, wrote on the Internet bulletin board Wine Berserkers that he lost 759 bottles of wine.
"He completely wiped us out," Laubach wrote. "He replaced some of the cases with cheap bottles of wine. My brother and I foolishly did not have insurance so a total loss. This is what Bill stole from us. We have been on the Rhys list since the beginning. He wiped us out of all of our Rhys from 2006 – 2013, All Bordeaux from 2003-2005, a lot of Pegau and Clos Des Papes, Barolo, Karl Lawrence, Outpost. Unfortunately, we have young families and are not in the position to replace the wine. We are officially out of the wine collecting business."
Holder's scheme does not seem particularly sophisticated, unlike the futures Ponzi scheme that landed John Fox, former owner of Premier Cru wine shop in Berkeley, in federal prison until April, 2021. According to the indictment, Holder simply sold wine that customers had stored with him.
"Holder represented to potential third-party buyers that he was the lawful owner of the wine that he was offering to sell," reads a press release from the Maryland US Attorney's Office. "By e-mail and facsimile, he sent them lists of bottles of wine stored in his warehouse with detailed descriptions of the winery, vintage, and asking price. After the buyers selected the bottles they wanted to purchase, Holder boxed and shipped the wine, and sent his bank account information. After inspecting the shipment of wine, the buyers would either wire the money directly into Holder’s bank account or send a check. Holder kept the proceeds from the sales and spent it on personal expenses."
The wine broker in Napa bought four batches of wine for about $90,000, according to the indictment, while a wine retailer in Washington DC bought 92 bottles for $15,000. Because the numbers don't add up, it's possible that the FBI is still investigating the case. The US Attorney's Office would not comment on the case.
Laubach also wrote on Wine Berserkers: "The maddening thing is that there is a very prominent store in DC that admitted to me and my brother that he had bought our wines from Mr Holder. His resolution was to sell them back to us at his cost. While I understand the owners position, he admitted he was in possession of wine he knew was stolen. The admirable thing to have done would have been to give them back to us."
The location of the store is interesting. The cynically named Safe Harbour – now closed – was in Glen Burnie on the south side of Baltimore, about a 45-minute drive from Monkton, Maryland, home of Robert Parker. There aren't many wine storage facilities in the Baltimore area, but it is not known if Parker stores any wine off-site.
The plea agreement is not set in stone, as it can be accepted or rejected by presiding US District Judge Catherine C. Blake. She has scheduled sentencing for July 31; Holder is expected to remain out of custody until then.
In the future, please refrain from posting chat material in the news forum.
Exactly.
If you have the money to pay someone for storage, you have enough money to build your own cellar. Anyone who doesn’t have insurance on valuables, especially those outside of arm’s reach deserves to be “wiped out”.
“I remember on one of those real crime TV shows a guy was putting fake labels on inexpensive bottles. Maybe fake bottles too, not sure.”
I’ve seen a local restaurant chef buying cases of Aldi’s Winking Owl wine brand to serve as house wine.
“If I understand your meaning, someone cut up a painting and sold the individual pieces.”
I think so, from what I understand Pollack did these massive canvases that can’t be hung anywhere and so they portion them out and you can have a piece for a price. But as somebody said in the comment section in response to my initial comment is that “they look like drip cloths” And they do!
As for the original intent of this thread and as for wine. Good wine is wasted on me. Cuz my taste buds are burned out and I can’t tell the difference between US $10 liter and a hundred dollar bottle.
Okay, sorry. Found it reading AP articles, but I hate using them as a source.
Okay, sorry. Found it reading AP articles, but I hate using them as a source.
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