MIAMI (AP) — A South Florida artwork seller and one other man face fees involving the sale of faux Andy Warhol artworks, authorities stated.
Leslie Roberts, 62, of Miami, and Carlos Miguel Rodriguez Melendez, 37, of Sunny Isles, have been arrested Wednesday and made their preliminary appearances in Miami federal court docket, based on court docket information.
Protection lawyer Nayib Hassan, who represents Rodriguez Melendez, stated his consumer maintains his innocence and appears ahead to presenting the total information in a court docket of regulation. Roberts’ protection lawyer and Miami Superb Artwork Gallery didn’t instantly reply to emails in search of remark in regards to the fees.
In accordance with the indictment, Roberts, the proprietor of Miami Superb Artwork Gallery in Coconut Grove, fraudulently represented artwork as authentic items created by famend artist Andy Warhol. Prosecutors stated Roberts falsely claimed to victims that he acquired the art work immediately from the Andy Warhol Basis for the Visible Arts and offered faux and fraudulent invoices to the victims.
Roberts additionally transferred a minimum of $240,000 in wire fraud proceeds from his Miami Superb Artwork Gallery checking account to a private checking account, the indictment stated.
Rodriguez Melendez falsely claimed to work for a New York-based public sale firm to fraudulently authenticate the art work, concealing that the art work was faux, investigators stated.
Roberts is charged with collaborating in a conspiracy to promote solid artwork utilizing faux and fraudulent invoices and authentications, and Rodriguez Melendez is charged with collaborating within the wire fraud conspiracy. They’ve been launched on bond, with an arraignment listening to scheduled for April 21.
If convicted, Roberts faces as much as 30 years in jail and Rodriguez Melendez faces 20.
One other South Florida artwork seller was sentenced in 2023 to 2 years and three months in federal jail for promoting faux Warhols. Daniel Elie Bouaziz, who owned two galleries in Palm Seashore County, had pleaded responsible to a single rely of cash laundering, whereas prosecutors agreed to drop 16 different counts associated to fraud and embezzlement.
Warhol was an American visible artist and filmmaker most related to the pop artwork motion of the Nineteen Sixties.
