Louvre Robbery Shines Spotlight on Security Issues

Entering the world’s most-visited art institution in broad daylight, taking eight pieces of priceless Napoleonic jewellery and vanishing into the city traffic on humble scooters may seem like the most audacious of crimes, executed for international notoriety and ensuing movie adaptations.

Specialists who observe trends in global cultural theft, however, see Sunday morning’s robbery at the Louvre as a more practical matter: the most recent in a series of smash-and-grab thefts focused more on the monetary worth of precious stones or materials than the historical importance, continuing a pattern that has appeared over the last decade in Germany, the UK and the US. The venue, they suggest, would have been of lesser importance to the thieves.

“You may ask why thieves who want to take valuable jewellery are breaking into a world-famous museum rather than a Cartier store,” said an expert in art recovery. “The answer is simple: it’s because nowadays a Cartier store is better protected.”

A spate of violent jewellery shop thefts mean that many stores have strengthened their security in the past few years, with security personnel on their premises and wares no longer kept on display overnight. Museums, meanwhile, look vulnerable, in part because of the inherent reason of being accessible institutions in historic buildings, and also the financial situation in many developed nations.

“Since Covid, authorities across the globe have reduced spending on law enforcement and the arts funding,” said Marinello. “With criminals entering the Louvre, it shows how vulnerable our institutions have become. This is a horrible time to be a museum.”

The robbery of the objects – featuring necklaces made up of eight sapphires and hundreds of gems, the tiara of Empress Eugénie containing thousands of diamonds and a hugely valuable crown once possessed by a royal that the thieves left by the roadside on their way out – has naturally drawn comparisons with the 1911 theft of the Mona Lisa from the Louvre, carried out by the Italian handyman Vincenzo Peruggia.

More relevant points of reference may be the recent theft of valuables from a German institution worth over millions, the taking of a £4.75m gold toilet from a UK landmark the that year, the recent heist of a valuable item from Berlin’s Bode Museum or even a spate of robberies of collector items from American institutions.

“There’s a simple pattern here,” said Marinello. “Smash, grab, and melt it down as rapidly as possible.”

If the artefacts were to remain intact, experts say, the criminals would struggle to sell them. “There’s no way to trade 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 would be immediately recognised, especially given the Ministry of Culture has published photos of the items. Even a private collector or an auction house would want to see paperwork establishing legal possession before touching such remarkable pieces.”

In the past, institutions were often hesitant to go public about the disappearance of famous works of art and would stay silent out of shame. These days, as art thefts are more reported on, the keeping and selling of taken items is risky business for any criminal.

“If you steal a Picasso, it has to stay complete or it becomes worthless, and you have to devise a scheme to conceal it, perhaps by passing it around dangerous individuals,” noted Marinello. “There's ongoing risk to the danger of an accomplice informing authorities to collect a ransom.”

For similar reasons, an investigator said it was vanishingly unlikely that the theft had been ordered. “Stolen to order is something from Hollywood movies,” he said. “No one would handle these items. It’s all around the world and in all the media. If you acquire these, if you get caught, you go to jail. You can't display it to your acquaintances, you cannot bequeath it to your children.”

Modifying stolen works by melting down or reshaping does lower the worth. When it comes to diamonds, it also comes with significant danger because contemporary methods give gems a bigger and brighter appearance, and antique-cut stones would either draw unwanted attention or barter the price down for a concealment.

Crucially, however, melting down or re-cutting removes the evidence of the crime. “I suspect that the robbers will try to bring the stolen goods to locations with diamond expertise like a country, another nation or even as nearby as a city, and locate an expert to cut out the gems,” suggested Marinello.

The heist at the Louvre has already brought up concerns about security measures at the institution, with a unauthorized official review expected to be released soon criticising “significant” and “persistent” slow progress in updating equipment and noting that security cameras were missing in many rooms. But specialists say displaying valuable objects in historic buildings with a constant flow of visitors comes with dangers that are impossible to remove entirely.

“Historic buildings are more difficult to protect,” said Erin Thompson. “They often have nice big street-facing windows that makes it easy for thieves to escape, 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 structures should be conceptualised “as a stronghold”, said Peter Stürmann. “There should be several layers to deter intruders.”

Contemporary structures are fitted with advanced external CCTV cameras or in-built vibration sensors that raise alarm about a broken glass in immediately, but old museums may be reluctant to alter their appearance. Detection devices can be difficult to fit to decorated surfaces. Motion and sound detectors may also have to be turned off during the daytime as hordes of visitors walk through a museum.

The schedule of the robbery, which took place between 9.30am and 9.40am local time, was typical of recent thefts, Stürmann said. “There’s a good reason why robberies tend to happen at either start or end of day. It’s often when security rotate and before the museum is full of visitors who actually act as additional security staff.”

Technological progress may have thrown up new gadgets that can raise the alarm more quickly and efficiently, but it has also provided robbers new methods with which to circumvent protections. In Paris, the thieves accessed the museum’s upper level with a mobile equipment and breached a glass pane with a battery-powered disc cutter.

An author said the conversation in the country about the 232-year-old structure had mostly centered on visitor management in recent years, and less on protection.

The institution has an on-site brigade of about 50 full-time emergency personnel, but their purpose is mostly to protect the artworks from blazes and water damage. “There isn't a rapid-response unit,” Sciolino said. “In the end, the security of the Louvre all depends on political will and funding, and currently France lacks sufficient money.”