by Giles Cadman
The wine industry has a number of unscrupulous people in it, including investment fraudsters, counterfeiters and thieves. A New York based company has two business partners in court over an alleged $500,000 fraud.
An Iranian prince has filed a lawsuit against his French business partner claiming the latter stole US$500,000 from their New York-based wine importer for his own use.
Charles Moreau, used company funds to pay for his rent in New York’s Financial District, his clothing, his cable bills and his daughter’s tuition.
Furthermore, Moreau is alleged to have taken thousands of dollars worth of wine from the cellars of Lions Wines and bartered them for meals at expensive restaurants such as Cipriani Downtown on West Broadway and Georgica in East Hampton.
General manager of Lions Wines, Alex Herringshaw, said in the affidavit that: “He (Moreau) would pay for his personal expenses but would not pay for business expenses like the rent, the storage, the phone bills, employees and taxes.”
It appears that Charles Moreau has done this kind of thing before.
The prince also claimed that Moreau is being pursued in France for a similar fraud case and for roughly the same amount of money, as well as being pursued by another business partner for failing to repay a $60,000 loan.
