Lee Habib here, for Our American Stories. In our ongoing “Rule of Law” series, we often explore how a commitment to fairness shapes our lives. Today, we meet Bill Koch, a passionate entrepreneur who deeply values the artistry and care poured into creation – from a great painting to a fine wine. So, when Bill discovered that bottles sold to him as rare Thomas Jefferson vintages were actually fakes, his passion for authenticity ignited a powerful resolve. This wasn’t just about expensive fake wine; it was a personal affront to the genuine love and effort he so admired.
What began as a personal disappointment soon revealed a vast, secretive world of wine fraud, protected by a “code of silence” where fakers, sellers, and even buyers benefited from deception. Unwilling to let this injustice stand, Bill Koch launched a determined legal crusade against the elaborate network of trickery. His pursuit of authenticity and justice ultimately exposed an industry worth tens of millions, demonstrating that sometimes, ordinary citizens must stand up for the Rule of Law when no one else will. This is a powerful American story of one man’s fight for what’s right.
📖 Read the Episode Transcript
You know what I really like: if you look at a great painting, you could tell the love the artist in creating it. And to me, that’s precious, and that’s what creates, in my opinion, great art, you know, is the love for what the artist was doing. And then food, too, you know, with an outstanding chef, you could taste that—oh my god—this tastes differently because he put a lot of love into it, which means he put a lot of energy and thought and everything else into it. And the same with a bricklayer: you know, if he really loves his work, he takes a little extra care in doing it, other than slapping it together. And the same thing with wine, the great wine, she could really taste the love that the vintner had in making it. And so that, to me, is highly offensive when someone is faking it.
Bill found out that four bottles that were sold to him as Thomas Jefferson’s were fake, and then he found out that more were, too.
There’s a huge code of silence because the faker doesn’t want to know that he’s faking. The middleman who’s selling the wine doesn’t really want to know if it’s fake. In fact, there was one big auction house that was selling a lot of wine in New York at auctions, and they had to have this retailer with them to get through the laws. And the guy who owns the retail shop said, ‘Why are you selling a lot of fake wine in this auction?’ And the head in-house counsel versus the outhouse counsel said, ‘Authenticity is an opinion, and we’re not in the opinion business. We’re in the business of making our margin, so just ignore it.’ And then the guys who buy the fake wine, that they find out it’s fake, they want to get rid of it and get their money back, so primarily either dump it into the auction market, or they give it to a charity to auction off, or they find some sucker that will buy it. Some of the fake wines I bought were from charity auctions because the guy gave it to him, and he got a tax deduction on it, and some others schmuck got them—mainly me, I got him—and so I just said, ‘I’m out of on a crusade, a legal crusade to shine a bright light on it.’ And I also, I guess because when I was younger, I was taken advantage of by people when I was naive, and so I said, ‘I just hate being cheated. Hated.’
One of the fakers actually offered to give Bill all of his money back, and Bill said, ‘No, we’re going to court.’
That’s right. Well, I ended up in one real long lawsuit, which we won hands down. And then after that, everybody wanted to settle with me. And there was one guy who said, ‘Well, I sold you these fake bottles. Would you give him back to me so I could give him back to the guy that sold him to me?’ And so I said, ‘All right, I will.’ But then I engraved ‘counterfeit’ on the bottles and gave him back to it. I haven’t heard from him since. One big faker sent me a fax saying, ‘Why are you worried about fake wine? Even Jesus turned water into wine.’ And I’m hoping I could get him into a court in the Bible Belt, but I couldn’t. One guy had a huge collection of pre-World War II bottles of Petrus, which is one of the best wines in the world, and oversized bottles. And I bought a bottle of 1921 Petrus and a double magnum, and I opened it up. God, that tasted like the cheapest wine I’ve ever had. And I looked at it, and there was an article about this wine, about how it was found and who found it, et cetera. And it was rated 100 out of 100. That’s why I bought this bottle. And what the guy did—the faker, I mean—they have a Hardy-Runstock, poured in 1957 wine into the bottle, and he made a fake label. We even found the place where he bought the bottle, and we found where he had the labels printed. And he poured in ’57 wine, put in some juice that made it taste old and smell. I said, ‘What he did was put moosepiss in it for me.’ And we took this bottle to the Petrus, and they said they never made big bottles pre-1945. And this one guy who had this huge collection of huge bottles called me up and said, ‘Are all our bottles fake?’ And we said, ‘Yeah, how do you know?’ ‘Well, we went to Petrus, and they said they never made them,’ and they said, ‘Oh my god!’ And then a month later he called up and said, ‘Why don’t you buy these bottles for me?’ And I said, ‘Why?’ He said, ‘Well, it’s good evidence.’ I said, ‘Well, I don’t need to pay you. I’ll just subpoena you.’ Unfortunately, crusades turn out to be long and very expensive.
Bill has spent $35 million going after the fakers over what was originally a $400,000 wine fraud. And some might say that’s a crusade not worth it, spending 87 and a half times the cost. But for Bill Koch, it is. The crusade isn’t about the wines. I mean, it’s a little bit about the wines, but Bill could have bought new wines for far less. What it’s really about to him is the rule of law. And Bill’s pursuit of the rule of law ended up exposing an industry of tens of millions of fake wine.
I try to say, ‘Well, it’s bad business to cheat when you get.’
Caught. And great job, as always, by Alex, and thanks to Bill Koch. A rule of law, because let’s face it, sometimes the cops can’t get these people, and sometimes, let’s face it, no one else can. Sometimes we, the citizens, have to go out and find these fakers. But if we can’t bring him to a court of law, if we can’t have the rule of law, then we have nothing at all. Bill Koch’s story, his crusade against fake wine and again and against fake everything, here on Our American Stories. Lee Habib here, and I’m inviting you to help Our American Stories celebrate this country’s 250th birthday, coming soon. If you want to help inspire countless others to love America like we do and want to help us bring the inspiring and important stories told here about a good and beautiful country, please consider making a tax-deductible donation to Our American Stories. Go to OurAmericanStories.com and click the donate button. Any amount helps. Go to OurAmericanStories.com and give.
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