Developer loses $1m wine stash

Anthem Winery. Photo / Supplied

A wealthy developer has lost his claim to a $1 million wine stash from his top Otago winery.

A High Court judge has ruled receivers for one of Christchurch millionaire David Henderson's companies, Anthem Holdings, are entitled to the wine and any proceeds from its sale.

Henderson said this week that the High Court decision related to only about $200,000 of wine because a large amount had been sold.

In her decision, Justice Christine French did not accept Henderson's evidence he had sold the wine to another of his companies.

Henderson was an "unreliable" and "at times evasive" witness, who contradicted his own written brief of evidence, she said.

The case related to about 6000 cases, or 72,000 bottles, of Anthem Vineyard wines, and another 30,000 litres in barrels.

Paul Sargison and John Leonard were appointed by Perpetual Trust as receivers of the personal property of Anthem Holdings in 2008.

Since then, bottled wine from 2006 and 2007 vintages, mostly pinot noir, has been stored at a bottling company in Cromwell.

Unbottled 2008 pinot noir has been kept at a winery in Wanaka.

Bottles sell for between $21 and $38, according to the vineyard's website. Even at wholesale prices, the stash was worth more than $1m.

The wine has been subject to a preservation order since 2008. On clearance of the amounts owing to bottling company Vinpro, half the net proceeds of its sale will be paid to Anthem Wine Company Limited and the rest to stakeholders Cousins and Associates.

Sargison said receivers would try to sell the remaining wine "so that we can make a distribution to the creditors of the company".

Henderson is the sole director of Anthem Holdings, previously known as Gibbston Valley Estates, which developed the vineyard near Queenstown.

Former All Black Grahame Thorne bought a house on the vineyard at mortgagee sale, and operates it as a lodge. Thorne said the vines were a mess because there hadn't been any work on the property for some time.

According to the judgement, the company intended to sell the vineyard in 4ha lots to private owners, who would pay for the vines to be maintained in return for payment for the grapes and shares in the winery.

But few were sold and most of the properties are now owned by companies associated with Henderson.

Originally one of several shareholders, Henderson later bought out the venture and changed the name to Anthem Vineyard.

One of the remaining lot-owners, Richard Guthrey, said the vineyard - which had produced award-winning pinot noir - had been neglected.

"If it's left another year it would get to the point where some of the vines would have to be pulled out and replanted."

The vines had not been irrigated, pruned, thinned or protected from frost. Instead of yielding 250 tonnes of fruit, his lot was likely to provide only about 20 tonnes this year.

"It's such a shame, because it's potentially one of the best sites in Central Otago," Guthrey said. "We've proved the quality was there but it's been systematically destroyed by neglect."

Guthrey now manages his own lot and has been in a dispute with Henderson over a management contract.

Henderson denied the claims and said the past two years had been the worst years for viticulture on record in Gibbston. The vineyard had been pruned and irrigated, but broken frost-fighting machines had resulted in some frost damage.

But he said the suggestion vines would need to be pulled was nonsense: "The whole vineyard is in fundamentally good shape."

- HERALD ON SUNDAY