Accused Bordeaux Cellars scammer pleads ‘not guilty’
James Wellesley, also known as Andrew Fuller, pleaded ‘not guilty’ in a New York court hearing on Friday, to defrauding wealthy wine collectors out of US$100 million via fake company Bordeaux Cellars. If convicted, he faces 20 years in prison.
In a high profile wine fraud case that has been unfolding for more than three years, two men stand accused of hoodwinking individuals into taking out loans backed by non-existent fine wines as collateral.
The alleged fraud was carried out under the company name Bordeaux Cellars and resulted in the loss of around US$100 million between 2017 and 2019.
Awaiting trial
Both James Wellesley and Stephen Burton are currently awaiting trial in New York, having been extradited to the US from the UK and Morocco respectively. Burton was found and arrested in 2022 after entering Morocco on a fake Zimbabwean passport.
As db previously reported, Burton pleaded not guilty on 16 December 2023. Wellesley entered an identical plea last Friday 11 July, 2025.
If convicted, each could face up to 20 years in prison for wire fraud, wire fraud conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy.
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Fine wines
Fuller and Burton are accused of flying to investor conferences to drum up interest in the scheme, tempting would-be investors with promises of large returns backed by cellars that housed fine wines including those from cult Napa producer Screaming Eagle. These impressive cellars did not in fact exist.
“Unlike the fine wine they purported to possess, the defendants’ repeated lies to investors did not age well,” District Attorney Breon Peace said when the pair were first charged.
“As alleged, these defendants duped investors by offering them an intoxicating investment opportunity collateralised by valuable bottles of fine wine that turned out to be too good to be true.”
Wellesley claims he had “no clue” about the scheme that Burton had allegedly devised. Both men have previous convictions for fraud.
In 2021, a year prior to their arrest, John E. Fox, who confessed to running a US$45 million wine Ponzi scheme through his store, Premier Cru, was released early from federal custody, having served just five and a half years as opposed to the six and a half years he was sentenced to. Fox is considered to be responsible for the world’s largest wine Ponzi scheme, siphoning off $45m from roughly 9,000 customers, according to court documents.
If the pair accused of masterminding the Bordeaux Cellars scam end up being convicted, their crimes will dwarf those of Fox.
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