Brit facing prison after pleading guilty to elaborate $99 million wine scam

A British man is facing a lengthy prison sentence in the US after pleading guilty to his role in an elaborate wine scam worth nearly $100 million.

James Wellesley, 59, pleaded guilty to charges of wire fraud conspiracy before US District Judge Pamela Chen in Brooklyn in a hearing on 7 October.

In July, Wellesley - who is also known as Andrew Fuller and used to be a lawyer in the UK before being disbarred - had previously pleaded not guilty to three charges, which included conspiracy.

Wellesley was sent to the US to face the charges after unsuccessfully trying to oppose an extradition order, and is now scheduled to be sentenced at a hearing next year.

Under federal sentencing guidelines, he could face a sentence of up to 12-and-a-half years in prison and has agreed to forfeit around $1 million, which is spread around over two dozen bank accounts.

James Wellesley is being held in the US (Kent Police)

Wellesley's co-defendant Stephen Burton, 61, previously pleaded guilty in July to wire fraud conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy.

Burton, who is also being held in jail in Brooklyn, accepted a forfeiture of $26 million.

They are due to be sentenced for a multi-million dollar wine scam which saw them conning victims into investing in high value wine that did not actually exist.

The pair posed as executives at London and Hong Kong registered Bordeaux Cellars.

They would promise investors that they would receive regular payments of interest from 'high net worth' wine collectors, a scheme that raised them $99.4 million.

Wellesley and Burton would claim that the loans were backed by a cellar containing over 25,000 bottles of wine including extremely valuable bottles from Domaine de la Romanee-Conti in Burgundy and Chateau Lafleur in Bordeaux.

Stephen Burton was also implicated in the scam (Kent Police)

But prosecutors alleged that Bordeaux Cellars in fact controlled a much smaller number of bottles, with the actual number being as few as 217.

They said that the defendants had used the loan payments to cover personal expenses, as well as paying interest to investors to keep the scam going while they pocketed millions.

Prosecutors said that the pair ran the scheme between June 2017 and February 2019 until it finally fell apart when the interest payments stopped.

According to court records, Wellesley has been scheduled for sentencing on February 3 2026, while Burton is set to be sentenced on January 6 2026.

Assistant FBI Director Christopher Raia previously said: “James Wellesley and his business partner allegedly concocted an elaborate scheme defrauding investors out of millions of dollars to finance their own personal expenses.

“Their alleged deceit spread across years and continents.”