Louvre heist losses estimated at $133 million as museum director faces grilling

PARIS – The jewellery stolen from the Louvre in Paris was valued at an estimated €88 million (S$133 million), a French prosecutor said on Oct 21, as the museum’s director faces security questions from a Senate committee over the brazen weekend heist.

The director, Ms Laurence des Cars, has not made any public statement since thieves

made off with royal jewels

during a daylight robbery on Oct 19 that took just seven minutes.

The Louvre reopened on Oct 22 following two days of shut doors for the investigation – to the frustration of thousands of tourists – and its weekly closure on Oct 21.

The theft reignited a row over the lack of security in French museums, after two other institutions were hit in September.

“The Louvre curator estimated the damages to be €88 million,” Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau said on Oct 21.

But she added that the greater loss was to France’s historical heritage, saying that the thieves would not pocket the full windfall if they had “the very bad idea of melting down these jewels”.

Scores of investigators were still looking for Oct 19’s culprits, working on the theory that it was an organised crime group clambering up a ladder on a truck to break into the museum. They dropped a diamond-studded crown as they fled.

Ms Beccuau confirmed that four people were involved in the robbery and said authorities were analysing fingerprints found at the scene.

Detectives were scouring video camera footage from around the Louvre as well as of main highways out of Paris for signs of the four people who escaped on scooters.

Ms des Cars, who has run the Louvre since 2021, is set to appear before the Senate’s culture committee from 4.30pm local time (10.30pm in Singapore) on Oct 22.

‘Worrying level of obsolescence’

A report by France’s Court of Auditors seen by AFP covering 2019 to 2024 points to a “persistent” delay in security upgrades at the Louvre. Only a fourth of one wing was covered by video surveillance.

In January, Ms des Cars warned Culture Minister Rachida Dati of a “worrying level of obsolescence”, citing the urgent need for major renovations.

Interior Minister Laurent Nunez on Oct 20 said he would tighten security outside cultural institutions.

In Oct 19’s heist, thieves parked a truck with an extendable ladder, like those used by movers, below the museum’s Apollo Gallery shortly after it opened. They climbed up and used cutting equipment to get through a window and open the display cases to steal the jewellery.

They made off with eight priceless pieces, including an emerald-and-diamond necklace that Napoleon I gave to his wife, Empress Marie-Louise, and a diadem that once belonged to Empress Eugenie, which is dotted with nearly 2,000 diamonds.

The museum on Oct 21 hit back at criticism that the display cases protecting the jewellery were fragile, saying they were installed in 2019 and “represented a considerable improvement in terms of security”.

‘Increasingly targeted’

In September, criminals broke into Paris’ Natural History Museum, making off with gold nuggets worth more than US$1.5 million (S$1.9 million).

French authorities announced on Oct 21 a 24-year-old Chinese woman

has been charged and put in detention

in that case after she was arrested in Barcelona, while trying to dispose of nearly 1kg of melted gold pieces.

Also in September, thieves stole two dishes and a vase from a museum in the central city of Limoges, with the losses estimated at US$7.6 million.

“Museums are increasingly targeted for the valuable works they hold,” according to the Central Office for the Fight against Trafficking in Cultural Property.

Labour unions have complained that security staff positions at the Louvre have been cut, even as attendance at the world-famous museum, whose extensive collections include the Mona Lisa, has soared.

“We cannot do without physical surveillance,” a union official said. AFP