🔗 Share this article

Entering the planet's most popular 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 ensuing movie adaptations.

Experts who observe patterns in global cultural theft, however, see the recent heist at the Louvre as a more practical matter: the most recent in a string of smash-and-grab thefts centered more on the material value of valuable gems or materials than the historical importance, perpetuating a trend that has emerged over the last ten years in Germany, Britain and the US. The venue, they propose, would have been of lesser importance to the thieves.

“You may ask why criminals who want to steal valuable jewellery are breaking into a world-famous museum rather than a luxury jewelry store,” stated Christopher A Marinello. “The answer is simple: it’s because these days a high-end boutique is better protected.”

A series of aggressive jewellery shop thefts indicate that many stores have strengthened their security in the past few years, with armed guards on their premises and merchandise no longer shown overnight. Museums, meanwhile, look vulnerable, partly because of the inherent factor of being public-facing institutions in older structures, and partly the current economic climate in many developed nations.

“After the pandemic, governments across the world have reduced spending on police and the culture sector,” noted 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 – including necklaces made up of eight sapphires and hundreds of gems, the crown of Empress Eugénie containing nearly 2,000 diamonds and a hugely valuable diadem once possessed by a royal that the thieves dropped by the street on their way out – has naturally drawn comparisons 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 recent burglary of valuables from a German institution worth over €113m, the taking of a multi-million pound valuable object from a UK landmark the same year, the 2017 robbery of a large gold coin from Berlin’s Bode Museum or even a series of robberies of sports memorabilia from American institutions.

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

If the items were to remain intact, experts say, the criminals would find it hard to sell them. “There’s no way to sell something as immediately identifiable as the museum's gems on the legal marketplace”, commented Lynda Albertson of the Association for Research into Crimes against Art.

“They are too well-known, especially given the Ministry of Culture has released images of the items. Even a individual buyer or an sales venue would want to see paperwork confirming legal possession before touching such remarkable pieces.”

In the past, institutions were often reluctant to go public about the disappearance of famous works of art and would stay silent out of embarrassment. Now, as art thefts are more reported on, the keeping and sale of taken items is dangerous for any criminal.

“If you steal a famous painting, it has to stay complete or it becomes valueless, and you have to conceive of a plan to conceal it, maybe by moving it among dangerous individuals,” noted Marinello. “There's ongoing risk to the danger of an partner telling the police to collect a ransom.”

For similar reasons, an investigator said it was highly improbable that the robbery had been ordered. “Stolen to order is something from Hollywood movies,” he said. “No one would handle these items. It's global news and in all the newspapers. If you acquire these, if you are apprehended, you end up in prison. You cannot show it to your friends, you cannot bequeath it to your family.”

Modifying taken items by dismantling or reshaping does lower the worth. When it comes to diamonds, it also comes with considerable risk because modern cutting techniques give gems a bigger and brighter appearance, and older-style stones would either attract notice or reduce value for a coverup.

Crucially, however, dismantling or reshaping eliminates the evidence of the theft. “I suspect that the robbers will try to bring the stolen goods to places with diamond expertise like a country, another nation or even as close as a city, and locate an expert to remove the stones,” suggested Marinello.

The robbery at the Louvre has already brought up concerns about protective steps at the institution, with a unauthorized official review expected to be released next month pointing out “considerable” and “persistent” delays in modernizing equipment and noting that surveillance were lacking in many rooms. But specialists say displaying precious items in historic buildings with a steady stream of visitors comes with risks that are impossible to eliminate completely.

“Historic buildings are much harder to protect,” said 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 can’t fit them with proper bulletproof glass.”

The most solid security systems for buildings should be conceptualised “as a stronghold”, said Peter Stürmann. “There should be several layers to deter intruders.”

Contemporary structures are equipped with advanced external CCTV cameras or integrated vibration sensors that alert about a broken glass in immediately, but old museums may be hesitant to alter their appearance. Laser scanners can be difficult to install to stuccoed ceilings. Sensors may also have to be disabled during the day as crowds stomp through a museum.

The timing of the robbery, which occurred between morning hours in Paris, was typical of recent thefts, Stürmann said. “It's logical why robberies tend to happen at either opening or closing times. It’s often 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 devices that can raise the alarm more quickly and efficiently, but it has also provided thieves new methods with which to bypass security measures. In the city, the thieves reached the museum’s upper level with a mobile equipment and breached a window with a battery-powered disc cutter.

Elaine Sciolino said the discussion in the country about the 232-year-old building had mostly focused on visitor management in the past decade, and not as much on protection.

The institution has an in-house brigade of about fifty permanent firefighters, but their purpose is mostly to safeguard the artworks from blazes and water damage. “There is no rapid-response unit,” Sciolino said. “Ultimately, the safety of the Louvre all depends on government support and funding, and at present France simply has no resources.”