🔗 Share this article

Entering the world’s most-visited art institution in the middle of the day, taking eight pieces of priceless Napoleonic jewellery and disappearing into the city traffic on simple scooters may seem like the most audacious of crimes, executed for international notoriety and ensuing Hollywood film treatments.

Experts who study patterns in global cultural theft, however, see the recent heist at the Louvre as a more practical matter: the most recent in a series of quick-hit thefts centered more on the material value of valuable gems or metals than the historical importance, continuing a trend that has appeared over the last ten years in Germany, the UK and the US. The location, they suggest, would have been of secondary concern to the criminals.

“You may ask why thieves who want to steal expensive jewellery are entering a globally renowned museum rather than a Cartier store,” said an expert in art recovery. “It's straightforward: it’s because nowadays a high-end boutique is more secure.”

A series of violent jewellery shop thefts mean that many stores have strengthened their security in recent years, with armed guards on their locations and wares no longer kept on display overnight. Museums, meanwhile, look vulnerable, partly because of the in-built factor of being public-facing institutions in older structures, and also the financial situation in many western countries.

“After the pandemic, authorities across the globe have cut back on law enforcement and the arts funding,” said Marinello. “With criminals entering the Louvre, it demonstrates how vulnerable our museums have become. This is a horrible time to be a museum.”

The robbery of the objects – featuring jewelry pieces made up of eight sapphires and 631 diamonds, the tiara of Empress Eugénie containing thousands of diamonds and a hugely valuable diadem once possessed by a royal that the robbers left by the street on their way out – has naturally been compared with the historical theft of the famous painting from the Louvre, carried out by the Italian handyman Vincenzo Peruggia.

Better points of reference may be the recent burglary of valuables from a German institution worth over €113m, the taking of a £4.75m gold toilet from a UK landmark the that year, the 2017 heist of a valuable item from a European museum or even a spate of robberies of collector items from American institutions.

“There’s a simple pattern here,” said Marinello. “Break in, take items, and dismantle them as quickly as possible.”

If the artefacts were to stay whole, experts say, the criminals would struggle to sell them. “There’s no way to trade something as recognizable as the museum's gems on the licit market”, commented Lynda Albertson of the a relevant organization.

“They are too well-known, especially given the Ministry of Culture has released images of the items. Even a individual buyer or an auction house would want to see documentation establishing legal possession before handling such remarkable pieces.”

In the past, institutions were often reluctant to announce publicly about the disappearance of famous art pieces and would stay silent out of shame. These days, as art thefts are more reported on, the storage and selling of stolen art is risky business for any lawbreaker.

“Taking a famous painting, it has to stay complete or it becomes valueless, and you have to conceive of a scheme to keep it in hiding, maybe by passing it around difficult criminal actors,” noted Marinello. “And you’re constantly exposed to the danger of an partner telling the police to cash in a ransom.”

For similar reasons, an art detective said it was highly improbable that the robbery had been commissioned. “Commissioned theft is something from Hollywood movies,” he said. “Nobody would touch this. It's global news and in all the newspapers. If you buy this, if you get caught, you go to jail. You can't display it to your friends, you cannot leave it to your children.”

Altering taken items by dismantling or reshaping does reduce the worth. When it comes to gems, it also comes with considerable risk because contemporary methods give stones a bigger and lighter appearance, and antique-cut stones would either attract notice or barter the price down for a coverup.

Crucially, however, dismantling or re-cutting eliminates the evidence of the theft. “I suspect that the robbers will try to take the stolen goods to locations with gem knowledge like Israel, India or even as nearby as Antwerp, and locate an expert to remove the gems,” said Marinello.

The robbery at the Louvre has already brought up concerns about protective steps at the institution, with a leaked state auditor report expected to be published soon pointing out “considerable” and “persistent” delays in modernizing systems and noting that surveillance were lacking in many rooms. But specialists say showing precious items in historic buildings with a constant flow of guests comes with risks that are not possible to remove entirely.

“Older structures are much harder to protect,” explained an art crime professor. “Many of them have nice big street-facing windows that makes it easy for criminals to get away, and there may be building protection statutes in place that mean you are unable to install them with proper bulletproof glass.”

The best protective measures for buildings should be designed “as a stronghold”, said Peter Stürmann. “There should be several layers to deter intruders.”

Modern buildings are fitted with state-of-the-art external CCTV cameras or in-built vibration sensors that raise alarm about a smashed window in immediately, but old museums may be reluctant to alter their appearance. Detection devices can be hard to fit to decorated surfaces. Sensors may also have to be disabled during the daytime as hordes of visitors stomp through a museum.

The timing of the robbery, which took place between 9.30am and 9.40am local time, was typical of recent thefts, Stürmann said. “It's logical why thefts tend to happen at either start or end of day. Frequently when guards change their shifts and before the museum is crowded who actually act as extra protection.”

Advances in technology may have thrown up new gadgets that can notify more rapidly and effectively, but it has also provided thieves new methods with which to bypass security measures. In the city, the robbers reached the museum’s first-floor window with a mobile equipment and breached a glass pane with a electric tool.

An author said the discussion in France about the 232-year-old structure had primarily centered on crowd control in the past decade, and not as much on protection.

The museum has an on-site team of about fifty full-time emergency personnel, but their purpose is mainly to safeguard the artworks from fires and water damage. “There isn't a rapid-response unit,” Sciolino said. “In the end, the security of the Louvre all comes down to government support and funding, and at present the nation lacks sufficient money.”