🔗 Share this article

Entering the world’s most-visited museum in broad daylight, taking eight items of invaluable Napoleonic jewellery and vanishing into the city traffic on simple scooters may seem like the boldest of crimes, executed for international notoriety and subsequent Hollywood film treatments.

Experts who study trends in global cultural theft, however, see the recent robbery at the Louvre as something more prosaic: the latest in a series of smash-and-grab thefts centered more on the material value of valuable gems or metals than the historical importance, continuing a trend that has emerged over the last decade in Germany, Britain and the US. The venue, they suggest, would have been of lesser importance to the criminals.

“You may ask why criminals who want to steal valuable jewellery are breaking into a world-famous museum rather than a Cartier store,” said Christopher A Marinello. “It's straightforward: it’s because these days a Cartier store is better protected.”

A series of aggressive jewellery shop thefts indicate that many stores have beefed up their protection in the past few years, with security personnel on their locations and merchandise no longer kept on display overnight. Cultural institutions, meanwhile, look more exposed, in part because of the in-built factor of being public-facing institutions in older structures, and also the financial situation in many western countries.

“Since Covid, authorities across the world have reduced spending on police and the culture sector,” said Marinello. “If thieves can get into the Louvre, it demonstrates how vulnerable our museums have become. This is a horrible time to be a museum.”

The theft of the items – including necklaces made up of eight sapphires and hundreds of gems, the tiara of Empress Eugénie containing nearly 2,000 diamonds and a extremely expensive crown once possessed by Napoleon III’s wife that the thieves left by the street on their way out – has naturally been compared with the 1911 theft of the famous painting from the same museum, carried out by the worker the thief.

More relevant comparisons may be the 2019 theft of jewellery from a German institution worth over €113m, the theft of a multi-million pound gold toilet from Blenheim Palace the same year, the recent robbery of a valuable item from a European museum or even a spate of thefts of sports memorabilia from American institutions.

“It's a clear trend here,” said Marinello. “Break in, take items, and dismantle them as quickly as possible.”

If the items were to remain intact, experts say, the criminals would struggle to sell them. “It's impossible to sell something as recognizable as the museum's gems on the licit market”, commented an art crime researcher of the a relevant organization.

“They would be immediately recognised, especially given the cultural authorities has published photos of the pieces. Even a individual buyer or an sales venue would want to see paperwork establishing legal possession before touching such remarkable pieces.”

In the previous years, museums were often reluctant to go public about the disappearance of famous art pieces and would stay silent out of shame. These days, as cultural robberies are more widely publicised, the storage and sale of taken items is risky business for any lawbreaker.

“Taking a famous painting, it has to remain intact or it becomes worthless, and you have to conceive of a scheme to keep it in hiding, maybe by passing it around dangerous individuals,” noted Marinello. “There's ongoing risk to the risk of an partner informing authorities to collect a reward.”

For similar reasons, an investigator said it was highly improbable that the theft had been commissioned. “Commissioned theft is something from films,” he said. “No one would handle these items. It’s all around the world and in all the media. If you buy this, if you get caught, you end up in prison. You cannot show it to your acquaintances, you cannot leave it to your children.”

Modifying taken items by dismantling or reshaping does lower the value. When it comes to gems, it also comes with significant danger because modern cutting techniques give gems a larger and lighter appearance, and older-style stones would either attract notice or barter the price down for a concealment.

Importantly, however, melting down or re-cutting removes the proof of the crime. “I suspect that the robbers will try to take the items to locations with diamond expertise like Israel, India or even as nearby as Antwerp, and find someone to remove the gems,” suggested Marinello.

The robbery at the Louvre has already raised questions about security measures at the institution, with a unauthorized official review expected to be released next month pointing out “significant” and “ongoing” delays in updating equipment and observing that surveillance were lacking in multiple areas. But specialists say displaying precious items in older structures with a steady stream of guests comes with risks that are impossible to eliminate completely.

“Older structures are much harder to secure,” said Erin Thompson. “They often have large accessible windows that makes it easy for thieves to get away, and there may be preservation laws in place that mean you are unable to install them with proper bulletproof glass.”

The most solid security systems for buildings should be designed “like a fortress”, noted Peter Stürmann. “There should be multiple levels to deter intruders.”

Contemporary structures are equipped with state-of-the-art surveillance systems or integrated seismic detectors that raise alarm about a smashed window in real time, but historic institutions may be reluctant to alter their exteriors. Laser scanners can be hard to fit to stuccoed ceilings. Sensors may also have to be disabled during the day 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 modern robberies, Stürmann said. “It's logical why thefts tend to happen at either opening or closing times. Frequently when security change their shifts and before the museum is full of visitors who effectively act as extra protection.”

Advances in technology may have introduced new gadgets that can raise the alarm more quickly and efficiently, but it has also given thieves new methods with which to bypass security measures. In the city, the thieves reached the museum’s upper level with a vehicle-mounted ladder and cut through a glass pane with a electric tool.

Elaine Sciolino said the conversation in the country about the historic structure had mostly centered on visitor management in the past decade, and less on protection.

The institution has an on-site brigade of about fifty full-time firefighters, but their mission is mainly to safeguard the artworks from fires and water damage. “There is no rapid-response unit,” Sciolino said. “Ultimately, the security of the Louvre all depends on political will and funding, and at present France lacks sufficient resources.”