Michigan art dealer Eric Spoutz has been sentenced to 41 months in prison for wire fraud charges in an elaborate scheme to sell fake artworks passed off as by modern American artists. His sentencing also includes three years supervised release and the forfeiture of $1.45m of “ill-gotten gains” he made in sales, plus $154,100 to be paid in restitution.

“Eric Spoutz used false and fictitious provenance to peddle his forged artwork to unsuspecting buyers, claiming they were masterpieces from Willem De Kooning, Franz Kline and Joan Mitchell,” Preet Bharara, US Attorney for the Southern District of New York, said in a statement. “Our Office has a long history of investigating—and prosecuting—those who try to contaminate the art world with fraudulent artwork. Thanks to the outstanding investigative work by the FBI, Spoutz’s alleged forgery mill is no longer in business.”

Since at least 2006, Sputz used various aliases, particularly “Robert Chad Smith” and “John Goodman." The criminal complaint says he created and provided forged receipts, bills of sale, and letters from deceased attorneys and other individuals, expressly to deceive collectors and others about fake artworks.

Spoutz, 33, according to the FBI, "sold dozens of fraudulent works of art – which he attributed to, among others, Willem De Kooning, Franz Kline, and Joan Mitchell – through various channels, including auction houses and on EBay."