Museum heists have changed. Why the Louvre robbery is a worrying escalation

By Jacqui Palumbo, Caitlin Danaher, CNN

(CNN) — Paris’ Louvre Museum had already been open for 30 minutes, and welcomed hundreds of visitors through its doors, when thieves in yellow vests scaled a truck-mounted ladder to the second-floor balcony of the Apollo Gallery, home to the French crown jewels, among other treasures.

Using an angle grinder to force open a window, they took just four minutes to enter the room, cut open two cases displaying Napoleonic jewels, grab nine pieces and flee back down the ladder.

Beyond its seemingly cinematic plot, the robbery was a clear example of how thieves have started targeting cultural institutions not necessarily for their prized paintings, but for artifacts that can be dismantled, stripped or melted down for their expensive parts.

Thieves executed a similarly daring raid on Dresden’s historic Green Vault in 2019, smashing their way into a glass case with an ax and making off with 21 diamond-studded Saxon treasures worth at least €113 million ($128 million).

Many of the treasures were recovered years later when five men were convicted of the crime, but some remain missing to this day. All five told investigators they didn’t know where the missing jewels were.

“What we’ve definitely seen in the last five to seven years is some more shift towards raw materials theft,” explained Remigiusz Plath, the secretary of the International Counsel of Museum Security, part of the International Counsel of Museums, whose experts keep information flowing across the European museum sector on security threats and best practices to safeguard institutions.

The move, Plath says, has been away from stealing art for its cultural value. Works by Pablo Picasso, Piet Mondrian or Willem de Kooning can resurface years, or decades, later in a building’s basement or behind an unassuming bedroom door. But experts say jewelry, coins or medals, meanwhile, are at risk of being lost forever — and quickly.

“My cynical belief is that these gems from the Louvre have most likely already been broken down for their parts,” said Laura Evans, an art crime historian, author and professor.

Her view is shared by other experts who have spoken to CNN about the case. “I don’t think that thieves probably care about the historical, cultural, or emotional significance of these gems as they were, and would not blink at cutting them down into different shapes and sizes. There’s a high liquidity when those gems are dismantled, but a stolen Monet, for example, has a really low liquidity, because it’s instantly recognizable.”

Plath called museums “a relatively soft target” compared to other highly secured buildings, such as banks. Museums have to balance security with the freedom to see and engage with their collections. “You can actually go in there, when the museum is open, and see it right in front of you,” he said. “And if you apply blunt force, just like a roof, you’re right there — there are not many thresholds to go through to have access to these raw materials.”

A change in tactics

Some of the most notorious museum robberies have captured the public imagination for their ingenuity or boldness. In 1990, at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, two men dressed as police officers pulled off the largest art heist in history, with 13 artworks, including three Rembrandts, and a Vermeer, that have never been found. In 1911, the Mona Lisa skyrocketed to international fame when a worker from the Louvre hid the small Leonardo da Vinci painting in his coat and spirited it away for two years.

As the details of the Louvre heist have emerged, the plan’s sophistication has crystallized. Like the highly orchestrated Green Vault heist, Evans called the Louvre incident a case of “cultural terrorism, executed with this military-style precision.”

“It’s not about exploiting the weakest link anymore,” she said. “It’s about using force.”

Police were met with several pieces of evidence when they arrived at the Louvre. Discarded by the truck were two grinders, a blowtorch, gasoline, gloves, a walkie-talkie, and a blanket. Laying nearby was a more eye-catching item, the crown of Empress Eugénie, the wife of Napoleon III, dropped by the thieves as they made their escape on Yamaha T-Max scooters along the Seine river.

The ornate gold piece, which features 1,354 diamonds and 56 emeralds, was damaged in the heist, prosecutors said.

Plath is concerned with what he believes are increasingly aggressive “grab-and-go” thefts as thieves gain access to buildings with powerful industrial tools — this time, shockingly, during the day, when the museum was already filled with visitors.

Museum robberies more often happen after hours with fewer risks to bystanders. Evans pointed to a rare case in 1972 when two men shot a security guard at the Worcester Art Museum while fleeing with four paintings that were later recovered. But the theft at the Louvre gives her a greater sense of unease that the danger could be escalating.

“With how these things are progressing, it’s probably only a matter of time before something like that happens again. That’s something that I definitely am worried about,” she said.

An investigation begins

With a national manhunt underway, questions are now being asked as to how the thieves managed to pull off such a feat, who they are, and why French institutions seem to be considered easy targets.

Before the Louvre robbery, thieves targeted Paris’ Natural History Museum in September, stealing gold nuggets worth €600,000 ($699,000), as well as antique Chinese porcelain worth €9.5 million ($11 million) from a museum in Limoges, south of the capital, the same month.

“If you’re an investigator for France, you are working under the theory at this stage that these are related because of the frequency, the boldness, the similarities in their mode,” theorized CNN’s senior national security analyst, Juliette Kayyem.

Plath, too, said they could be connected, or copycats who have observed the effectiveness of other heists. Natalie Goulet, a centrist member of the French senate, told CNN on Monday that the robbery was probably linked to organized crime. In the case of the 2019 Green Vault robbery, the five men convicted were part of the Remmo clan, one of Germany’s most powerful crime families, which operates mostly in Berlin.

French authorities will lead the investigation, though Interpol’s dedicated Cultural Heritage Crime unit may become involved if French officials suspect there is an international component. Interpol confirmed on X that the Napoleonic crown jewels have been added to its database for stolen artworks and artifacts.

For French Justice Minister Gérald Darmanin, the heist spotlights embarrassing security failings at one of France’s most venerable institutions. “The French people all feel like they’ve been robbed,” he told France Inter radio.

“One can wonder about the fact that, for example, the windows hadn’t been secured, about the fact that a basket lift was on a public road… What is certain is that we have failed,” he said.

Evans said that though many will be drawn to the salacious details of the heist — like any riveting crime thriller — there is a deep sense of national loss that should not be forgotten.

“I would encourage people to see beyond the sensationalism of the heist and how it was executed,” she said. “There’s a real hole in the cultural heritage and the history of France as a nation.”

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