Bitter Star
Cases unlock in order, like levels. This is case 3 of 100.
Maison Garnier, Lyon, 10:40 pm. On the restaurant's gala night, the critic Bernard Roux collapsed at table 7 between the cheese and the dessert.
He is in a coma, but the doctors say he will survive. They speak of a fast-acting poisoning, swallowed less than half an hour earlier.
Three people prepared or served what Roux put in his mouth that night. One of them wanted him never to write again.
Private room of Maison Garnier, with the gala tables still set.
Suspects
Amélie GarnierChef and owner of the restaurant, 41
Karim HaddadSous-chef, 33
Lucas MoreauSommelier, 38
The real case
Rudy Kurniawan's wine forgeries
United States, 2004 to 2014
This case is a work of fiction. The characters, names, places and events in the game do not portray real people. The account below is a factual summary, based on public sources, of the case that served as inspiration.
Rudy Kurniawan became a well-known figure in the American rare wine market by selling and auctioning bottles from legendary Burgundy and Bordeaux vintages. In 2008, producer Laurent Ponsot noticed that lots of Clos Saint-Denis offered at auction bore vintages the domaine had never made, and he began to investigate.
In 2012 the FBI found a forgery workshop in Kurniawan's home: printed labels, corks, capsules and empty bottles of expensive wines, which he refilled with blends of cheaper ones. He was convicted in 2013 and served a ten-year sentence. Poisoning with aconite, a toxic plant, is a method seen in real cases, such as a 2010 London trial in which a meal had been laced with the root.
The game borrows the scam of selling ordinary wine under a rare vintage's label and the idea of an expert who exposes the fraud. Characters, setting and outcome are fiction.