‘Smash, grab, melt’: How material value likely motivated the Louvre heist | Paris

TStorming into the world’s most visited museum in broad daylight, seizing eight pieces of Napoleon’s priceless jewels and disappearing into Paris traffic on humble motorbikes might seem like the most audacious of crimes, carried out for the sake of international fame and subsequent Hollywood blockbuster treatment.

Experts who monitor international art crime trends, however, see Sunday morning’s Louvre robbery as something more prosaic: the latest in a series of smash-and-grab thefts that have focused more on the material value of gems or precious metals than the importance of the artifacts, continuing a pattern that has emerged over the past decade in Germany, Britain and the United States. They point out that the location would have been a secondary concern to criminals.

“You might wonder why thieves who want to steal expensive jewelry would break into a world-famous museum instead of a Cartier store,” said Christopher Marinello, a leading expert in recovering stolen art. “The answer is simple: because these days the Cartier boutique is better protected.”

A spate of violent thefts at jewelery shops has meant that many outlets have beefed up their security in recent years, with armed guards on their premises and goods no longer on display overnight. At the same time, museums appear more vulnerable, partly because they are public-facing institutions in historic buildings, and partly because of the current economic climate in many Western countries.

“Since Covid, governments around the world have scaled back law enforcement and culture sector efforts,” Marinello said. “If thieves can get into the Louvre, it shows how vulnerable our institutions have become. “This is a terrible time to be a museum.”

The theft of items – including necklaces of eight sapphires and 631 diamonds, Empress Eugenie’s tiara featuring nearly 2,000 diamonds and a very valuable tiara that once belonged to Napoleon III’s wife and which the thieves had tossed on the side of the road on their way out – has inevitably drawn comparisons with the 1911 theft of the Mona Lisa from the same museum, carried out by the Italian. Handyman Vincenzo Peruggia.

Better reference points might be the 2019 theft of jewelery from the Green Vault Museum in Dresden worth more than €113 million, the theft of a gold toilet worth £4.75 million from Blenheim Palace in the same year, the 2017 theft of a large gold coin from the Bode Museum in Berlin, or even a series of sports memorabilia thefts from US mining museums.

In each case, the crimes appeared to be motivated mostly by the material value of the items that had disappeared. “There’s a little pattern here,” Marinello said. “Smash it, seize it, and melt it down as quickly as possible.”

Experts say that if the artifacts remain intact, thieves will have difficulty finding a buyer. “There is no way to sell something as instantly recognizable as Louvre jewelry on the legitimate market,” said Linda Albertson, of the Society for Research into Crimes Against Art, an organization that tracks trends in museums, including thefts and vandalism.

“They will be instantly recognizable, especially since the Ministry of Culture has released photos of the pieces. Even a private collector or auction house like Sotheby’s or Christie’s will want to see the papers proving correct ownership before touching such exquisite pieces.”

In the past, museums were often reluctant to announce the disappearance of famous works of art, remaining silent out of embarrassment. These days, with art thefts so widespread, storing and selling stolen art is a risky business for any criminal.

“If you steal a Picasso, it has to remain intact or it becomes worthless, and you have to think of a plan to keep it hidden, perhaps by passing it between tough criminal actors,” Marinello said. “And you’re always at risk of an accomplice tipping off the police for ransom.”

For similar reasons, art investigator Arthur Brand said it was unlikely that the theft was ordered, and Dutch media also reported that this could be the case for Dacian gold treasures stolen in January from the Drents Museum in the Netherlands. “Stolen to order is something out of a Hollywood movie,” he said. “Nobody touches this. It’s all over the world and in all the newspapers. If you buy this, if you get caught, you’ll end up in prison. You can’t show it to your friends, and you can’t leave it to your kids.”

Altering stolen works by melting or recutting reduces their value. When it comes to diamonds, it also comes with a lot of risk because contemporary cutting techniques give the stones a larger surface area and are lighter, and antique cut stones either draw unwanted attention or trade off price reductions for coverage.

But it is crucial that melting or re-cutting remove evidence of the crime. “I think the Louvre thieves will try to move the stolen goods to places with diamond expertise like Israel or India or even closer to Antwerp, and find someone to cut the gems,” Marinello said.

The Louvre theft has already raised questions about security measures at the museum, with a leaked government auditor’s report expected to be published next month criticizing “significant” and “persistent” delays in upgrading equipment and noting the lack of security cameras in many rooms. But security experts say that displaying valuable items in historic buildings with a constant flow of visitors comes with risks that are impossible to completely eliminate.

“Historic buildings are much more difficult to protect,” said Erin Thompson, a professor of art crime at the City University of New York. “A lot of them have nice big windows overlooking the street which makes it easier for burglars to escape, and there may be building protection laws in place which mean you can’t fit them with proper bulletproof glass.”

Peter Stuurmann, of German security company VZM, which advises museums and archives, said the most robust security systems for buildings should be “like a castle”. “There must be several layers to repel attackers.”

Modern buildings are equipped with state-of-the-art external CCTV cameras or built-in seismic detectors that sound the alarm about a broken window in real time, but older museums may be reluctant to deface their exterior. It can be difficult to install laser scanners on plasterboard ceilings. Motion and sound detectors may also need to be disabled during the day as hordes of visitors wander through the museum.

The timing of the Louvre raid, which occurred between 9:30 a.m. and 9:40 a.m. local time, was typical of recent thefts, Sturman said. “There is a good reason why thefts occur at either opening or closing times. This often occurs when guards change shifts and before the museum is full of visitors effectively serving as additional security staff.”

Advances in technology may have given rise to new tools that can raise an alarm more quickly and efficiently, but it has also given thieves new tools with which to circumvent security measures. In Paris, thieves accessed a first-floor window of the museum using a ladder mounted on a vehicle and cut a glass panel using a battery-operated disc cutter.

Conversation in France about the 232-year-old building has focused mostly on crowd control in recent years, and less on security, said Eileen Ciolino, author of “Adventures in the Louvre: How to Fall in Love with the World’s Greatest Museum.”

The museum houses an on-site brigade of about 50 permanent firefighters, or sapeurs-pompiersBut their mission is mainly to protect the group from fires and floods. “There is no rapid response unit,” Ciolino said. “Ultimately, the security of the Louvre Museum depends on political will and money, and France currently does not have the money.”

Additional reporting by Sinai Poztas