Koch paid more than $300,000 for 4 bottles supposedly owned by the late President Thomas Jefferson. "The simple, straightforward solution to this problem was for Christie's to recognize its wine department was acting as an independent, rogue division, admit it and clean it up immediately," Koch said after filing a suit in Manhattan Federal Court on Tuesday, according to a report in the NYdailynews.com.
Koch bought a 1787 Lafite Bordeaux with Thomas Jefferson's initials etched into the bottle and three other bottles supposedly from Jefferson's collection in 1988. They were sold by a German collector - but Koch says Christie's gave the lot its stamp of approval by advertising it in earlier catalogs.
The suit claims Christie's knew there were problems because a Jefferson scholar raised serious doubts in 1986. He claims he didn't have any knowledge about the bottles being fake until he was asked to showcase his wine at a Boston museum in 2005. The following year, he sued the seller, German collector Hardy Rodenstock who still insists that the wine is original and the sale was legitimate.
Says a Christie’s spokesperson reportedly, "While we have great respect for Mr. Koch, we believe the allegations in this complaint are incorrect.” |