Florida Art Dealer Accused of Peddling Forged Warhols
145April 18, 2025
Florida galleristLeslie Robertshas been charged in federal court with wire fraud stemming from a conspiracy to sell fake Andy Warhol artworks using forged invoices and authentications. According to astatementfrom the US District Attorney’s office for the Southern District of Florida, Roberts is alleged to have sold the pieces out of hisMiami Fine Art Galleryin Coconut Grove, Florida, and to have told potential customers that he had obtained them directly from the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, supplying falsified invoices as proof. Roberts was also hit with a money laundering charge, related to the accusation that he transferred the proceeds from the sales—in the respective amounts of $150,000, $40,000, and $50,000—from the gallery account to his personal bank account.
A second man, Carlos Miguel Rodriguez Melendez, was also charged with wire fraud for pretending to be an employee of a New York-based auction company, under whose fictional auspices he “authenticated” the works in question. The wire fraud charge carries a sentence of up to twenty years in federal prison, while the money laundering charge could net Roberts up to ten years in the same establishment.
The Miami New Times reports that the “nattily attired,” toupée-sporting Roberts already boasts a checkered past, dating back to his youth, when, according to a 1986 New York Times article, he dropped out of college without notifying his parents, convincing them instead that the movie theater he was working at was paying his tuition. Since then, according to the publication, he has become embroiled in no fewer than eight lawsuits in which he was accused of selling forged works or of failing to deliver purchased art. To date, he has served two years in federal prison on art fraud charges and has filed for bankruptcy twice.
“Out of my top three art fraud cases,” retired FBI agent Robert Giczy, who spent thirty years investigating art crimes, told the New Times, “Les Roberts ranks right in there.”