5 extra individuals have been arrested in reference to the crown jewels heist on the Louvre, French prosecutors confirmed on Thursday.
Included within the group is among the suspected robbers, who authorities say was recognized with DNA proof collected from the scene.
A four-person workforce ransacked the Louvre‘s Apollo Gallery in broad daylight on Oct. 19 after coming into via a damaged window and working away with $102 million price of jewelry.
Laure Beccuau, the lead prosecutor within the case, advised RTL radio that discovering the DNA-linked suspect was “one of many targets of the investigators — we had him in our sights,” she mentioned, including that “others taken into custody could possibly inform us about how the occasions unfolded.”
She didn’t disclose their identities or present any further particulars.
The thieves made off with a diamond-and-emerald necklace that Napoleon Bonaparte gave to Empress Marie Louise as a marriage present, in addition to crown jewels tied to Nineteenth-century queens Marie-Amélie and Hortense, and Empress Eugénie’s pearl-and-diamond tiara.
Separate operations in Paris and the adjoining Seine-Saint-Denis have resulted in a complete of seven arrests in reference to the heist.
Nonetheless, the whereabouts of the jewels stay unknown, apart from one relic that has surfaced — Eugénie’s crown, broken however salvageable, which suspects dropped throughout their escape.
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Police made the first two arrests within the case on Saturday, in keeping with French media, together with a person who was getting ready to go away France from Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport.
Law enforcement officials work contained in the Louvre museum, Sunday, Oct. 19, 2025, in Paris.
AP Photograph / Thibault Camus
It took thieves — who used a basket carry to scale the constructing’s exterior partitions — lower than eight minutes to interrupt into the world’s most visited museum, a feat the museum’s director referred to as a “horrible failure.”
Thieves stole the basket carry used to achieve the constructing’s higher flooring 9 days earlier than the breach occurred.
Safety footage reveals the crew ascending to the Apollo Gallery window at 9:30 a.m. on the day of the raid. By 9:38, the suspects had departed, carrying loot, as they sped away on scooters.
Solely the “near-simultaneous” arrival of police and museum safety stopped the thieves from burning the carry, which in flip preserved essential proof, the prosecutor mentioned earlier than reiterating her enchantment to any remaining suspects, saying, “These jewels at the moment are, after all, unsellable.… There’s nonetheless time to provide them again.”
Specialists warn that the gold could possibly be melted down and that valuable stones could possibly be recut to erase their previous, which some Louvre guests say would go away an indelible stain on French historical past.
“It’s essential for our heritage…we marvel how this might even occur — nevertheless it was essential that the blokes had been caught,” Freddy Jacquemet advised The Related Press.
“I feel the primary factor now could be whether or not they can get well the jewels,” Diana Ramirez added. “That’s what actually issues.”
Based on investigators, there isn’t a proof of insider assist right now; nonetheless, they don’t seem to be ruling out a wider community past the 4 suspects caught on safety cameras.
After a brief interval of closure, the Louvre reopened on Oct. 22.
— with recordsdata from The Related Press
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