What began with a few mysterious deaths in March 1986 quickly became the biggest wine scandal in Italian history. The consequences extended far beyond the tragedy itselfāthey transformed an entire industry.
Raffaella Usai
Wine journalist with a passion for ItalyĀ travelling and enjoyment
When Armando Bisogni was found dead in his Milan flat on 3 March 1986, no one could have imagined that his death would set in motion Italyās biggest wine scandal. The 48-year-old had actually died the day before. On the table beside him was a two-litre bottle of Barbera, bought for 1,890 lire ā the equivalent of just under one euro at the time ā at an āEsselungaā supermarket. This cheapest of table wines was to prove a deadly trap. Two days later, another man died; a heart attack was initially suspected. It soon emerged that he, too, had been drinking the Barbera. When, a few days later, a woman was admitted to hospital with severe nausea and cramps and went blind shortly afterwards, the doctors were still at a loss.
The bottles of Barbera were analysed in the laboratory.
ANSA ā Archivio Fotografico dellāUnitĆ (Wikipedia)
It was not until at Milanās Niguarda Hospital that Dr Franca Davanzo from the Poison Control Centre, together with her colleagues, recognised the connection: the patients were suffering from methanol poisoning. When, on 13 March, six further patients were admitted with the same symptoms following a party, the suspicion was confirmed: the cause of the mysterious poisonings was wine adulterated with methanol.
This was reported by the ‘Corriere della Sera’, which on 18 March 1986 became the first daily newspaper to break the story of the mysterious deaths with the headline āTre morti a Milano per vino sofisticatoā (āThree dead in Milan from adulterated wineā). That was only the beginning. In total, over 20 people died, whilst many more went blind or suffered serious damage to their health. Images of the poisoning victims were seen around the world.
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The Carabinieriās NAS special unit seized suspicious bottles in a supermarket.
Ansa (Wikipedia)
On the trail of the adulterators
It quickly became clear to the investigators that the incidents were not the result of a production fault, but rather deliberate and organised food fraud. Although methanol is produced in minimal quantities during the fermentation of grapes, it is highly toxic in higher concentrations. It damages almost all organs and primarily attacks the central nervous system.
The inspectors analysed the seized bottles of wine and found extremely high concentrations of methanol. Using batch numbers, delivery notes and distribution channels, the police and the public prosecutorās office traced the winesā journey to several bottling plants in Piedmont and Liguria. Initially, the bottlers Vincenzo and Carlo Odore, in the province of Asti, came under the investigatorsā scrutiny. The father and son had bottled the contaminated wine and put it on the market, but were unaware that it had been adulterated and were later fully exonerated. Nevertheless, the damage to their reputation ruined their business.
Whilst the investigators were searching for the perpetrators, many producers apparently attempted to dispose of incriminating evidence. Eyewitnesses reported that wine laced with methanol had turned rivers red. It was often disposed of via hidden pipes into the sewer system. The investigators worked on two fronts simultaneously: they wanted to prevent further cases of poisoningāand at the same time uncover the criminal network behind the wine adulteration.
Whilst ethyl alcohol (ethanol) is the drinkable alcohol found in wine, methanol is a highly toxic alcohol. Synthetically produced ethyl alcohol is not used in the drinks industry.
Wikimedia Commons / DMacks
House searches uncovered incriminating documents and further contaminated batches. In the course of the investigation, around 60 wine-producing businesses were inspected and more than 200 people were interviewed. In April 1986, seven suspects were finally arrested. The wine merchants Giovanni and Daniele Ciravegna from Narzole in Piedmont were considered to be the main culprits. The prosecution was convinced that they had adulterated substandard wine with a far too high dose of methanol before selling it on to bottlers. Giovanni Ciravegna maintained his innocence until the very end, stating that he had assumed the substance was ordinary ethyl alcohol and not the highly toxic methyl alcohol.
Also arrested were four members of a network that organised the trade in methanol, as well as the wine merchant Antonio Fusco from Manduria, whose contaminated rosĆ© wine had been seized in Marseille. Investigators ultimately concluded that this was an organised fraud scheme in which methanol was deliberately used to artificially enhance the quality of watery wine and generate higher profits. As the grapes at the time often yielded too little sugarāand therefore too little alcoholādue to high yields, methanol was used as a cheap substitute to increase the alcohol content. This made it possible to turn wine of the lowest category into a supposedly higher-quality product.
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Court proceedings did not begin until five years later
It was not until five and a half years after the scandal that the trial began in November 1991. Representatives from a total of 31 companies stood trialāincluding wineries, traders, haulage firms, and bottlers. In May 1993, the Court of Appeal upheld the verdicts: the main defendants were sentenced to up to 14 yearsā imprisonment for forming a criminal organisation, food adulteration, and multiple counts of manslaughter with conditional intent. The prosecution had originally argued for a charge of intentional manslaughter, but the court assessed the pursuit of profit as the motive and ruled that the perpetrators had knowingly accepted the risk of consumersā deaths.
Although the victims were awarded compensation totalling four billion lire (around 2.1 million euros at the time), however, nothing was actually paid out, as the convicted individuals were officially destitute. Consequently, relatives and survivors founded the āAssociazione Vittime del Metanoloā in 1993, which fought unsuccessfully for decades for state recognition and financial redress.
Angelo Ferlicca, whose mother Valeria went blind after drinking the adulterated wine, criticises the fact that the victims have never been compensated, despite the perpetrators having been convicted. For him, this is āthe real scandal behind the scandalā.
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Quality becomes a strategy
In retrospect, the methanol scandal is regarded as a turning point for Italian viticulture. According to Professor of Viticulture Attilio Scienza, it was not the cause of the crisis, but rather its dramatic culmination. As early as the 1960s, structural change, mass production, and illegal āadjustmentsā to inferior wines had been undermining quality standards.
The tragedy ultimately led to stricter controls, modern analytical methods, and a fundamental rethink within the industry. Quality, provenance, and traceability gained in importance. Subsequently, many wineries invested heavily in vineyards and cellar technology. Yields were reduced, modern winemaking techniques were introduced, and international oenology was combined with regional traditions. At the same time, provenance and terroir came more into focus.
The Italian appellation systems also took on new significance. DOC and DOCG wines continued to evolve into promises of quality that were not merely stated on the label, but were backed up by checks.
Todayās DOC band bears a unique serial number, which allows each bottle to be traced back to the producer.
Consorzio Sicilia DOC
Regions such as Piedmont, Tuscany, South Tyrol, and Veneto in particular benefited from this development in the long term. Today, almost half of Italyās wine production comes from DOC and DOCG areas, and Italy has become one of the leading exporters of high-quality wines.
The scandal cost lives and severely undermined confidence in Italian wine. Yet it forced the industry to undergo a ruthless self-assessment. In retrospect, 1986 was therefore not only a year of crisis, but the starting point of a success story that continues to shape Italian viticulture to this day.
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