The Paris criminal court will give its verdict on 12 January in the tax fraud and money laundering case against the Wildenstein family of art dealers, the presiding judge announced on Thursday, 20 October. Six individuals and two finance companies are charged with having hidden the majority of a fortune estimated at several billion euros in works of art and property from French tax authorities, thanks to sophisticated financial arrangements. The prosecution requested four years in prison, two suspended, and a massive fine of €250m for Guy Wildenstein, the principal heir of the globally recognised art dealing dynasty, following the death of his father Daniel and brother Alec. It only asked for a six months suspended prison sentence for another younger heir, Alec Wildenstein Jr, judging that he was “much less involved”.
The lawyers for the defence asked for acquittals and argued about the legal uncertainty around the financial trusts in which the Wildensteins registered their assets. The rule that requires such trusts to be declare to French tax authorities only went into effect in 2011, while the family patriarch Daniel Wildenstein died in 2001 and his son Alec died in 2008.