Dietmar Machold: The Bernie Madoff of violin dealers

Dietmar Machold - the so-called 'Stradivarius man' - has rocked the genteel world of antique instrument dealers with his phoney violins.

Dietmar Machold lived like a prince, "a fairytale figure adored by highbrow music mavens and high-stake financiers", in an imposing 700-year-old fortress outside Vienna, says Strings Magazine. As the world's foremost expert in Stradivarius violins, he amassed a fortune buying and selling rare instruments. Today he's in an Austrian jail awaiting trial for a fraud that has sent shockwaves through the classical music industry. His victims, including musicians, millionaires and museums, are so numerous that he's earned the moniker, "the Bernie Madoff of violin dealers".

Machold's arrest last year capped "the slow-motion collapse of an empire that once spanned the globe", says the New Jersey Star-Ledger. The FBI began investigations in 2004, but his standing within the "genteel world of fine violins" was so great that he continued to operate with impunity, dismissing any allegations against him as "the ravings of jealous competitors".

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