French antiques expert who duped Versailles sentenced to jail

PARIS

A French court on June 11 sentenced a top antiques expert to jail for duping the Palace of Versailles and wealthy collectors into buying furniture he had helped build, claiming it dated from the 18th century.

The ruling from the court in Pontoise, north of Paris, caps one of the biggest forgery scandals to rock the rarified world of France's top museums.

Bill Pallot, 61, along with five other people as well as a prominent gallery, stood trial in the spring.

Pallot and woodcarver Bruno Desnoues were convicted of having produced and authenticated chairs they sold, which they passed off as historic pieces that once adorned the rooms of the likes of Madame du Barry, the mistress of Louis XV, or of Queen Marie-Antoinette.

Customers duped by the pieces included the Palace of Versailles and wealthy collectors including a member of the Qatari royal family.

Pallot was sentenced to a four-year term including four months behind bars, fined 200,000 euros and handed a five-year ban on working as an expert. He will not go to jail having spent time in detention after his arrest.

Known for his distinctive long hair and three-piece suits, Pallot has been described by magazine Vanity Fair as "the world's leading expert on the works of 18th-century France."

Pallot said the sentence was "a little harsh financially," although he was satisfied that his apartment would not be seized, contrary to the prosecutor's demand.

Desnoues, a prominent woodcarver, was sentenced to a three-year term including four months behind bars, and fined 100,000 euros.

A lawyer for the Palace of Versailles implied the men got away too easily, denouncing "the particularly diabolical maneuvers" of the two main defendants and pointing to "clean, white-collar trafficking."

"We feel that we are not protected for the future," she said.