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The thieves behind the daring Louvre Museum heist in Paris, France, appear to have used a truck-mounted moving lift — the kind professional movers use to hoist furniture up to apartment windows — in order to scale the building’s second floor, according to Laure Beccuau, the Paris prosecutor.
The burglars pretended they were hiring the freight lift for a move and when the equipment owner or representative arrived to verify the job, the suspects threatened that person, forcing them to hand it over and leave the scene, Beccuau said in an interview with RTL radio, according to The New York Times.
Authorities said the thieves spent less than four minutes inside the Louvre on Sunday morning. They allegedly wheeled the vehicle to the Seine-facing façade, a window was forced open, and two vitrines were smashed.
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The thieves made away with a total of eight objects, including a sapphire diadem, necklace and single earring from a set linked to 19th-century queens Marie-Amélie and Hortense. The heist has prompted a national reckoning, with some officials comparing the shock to the 2019 burning of Notre-Dame cathedral.
They also stole an emerald necklace and earrings tied to Empress Marie-Louise, Napoleon Bonaparte’s second wife, and a reliquary brooch. Empress Eugénie’s diamond diadem and her large corsage-bow brooch — an imperial ensemble of rare craftsmanship — were also part of the loot.
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One piece — the emerald-set imperial crown of Empress Eugénie, with more than 1,300 diamonds — was later found outside the museum, damaged but recoverable.
Beccuau said the stolen items were valued at around $102.1 million and that the team investigating the heist has grown to 100 people.
The pieces were not insured, which is not uncommon for state collections because of the prohibitive costs, the Times reported, citing France’s culture ministry. The ministry reportedly said that the state “acts as its own insurer” when works are in their usual place of conservation “given the cost of taking out insurance” and the fact that “the accident rate is low.”
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Beccuau told local media that investigators believe the robbers may have been commissioned by a collector or were purely motivated by the value of the jewels and precious metals, Reuters reported.
“We’re looking at the hypothesis of organized crime,” Beccuau told BFMTV, noting that the thieves could be professionals operating on spec for a buyer.
Beccuau added that if a collector did commission the heist, there is hope that the stolen pieces will remain intact and well-preserved until recovered, the outlet reported. If the thieves acted independently, they may have targeted the jewels for their potential use in laundering criminal proceeds.
“Nowadays, anything can be linked to drug trafficking, given the significant sums of money obtained from drug trafficking,” Beccuau said, according to Reuters.
Investigators are keeping all leads open, but foreign interference has reportedly been largely ruled out in the case.
The Sunday morning smash-and-grab unfolded just 270 yards from the Mona Lisa.
Prosecutors revealed Monday that a vest, bottle of liquid and equipment left behind at the scene are now being examined.
The Louvre reopened Wednesday morning to crowds under its glass pyramid
Fox News Digital’s Bonny Chu, Ronn Blitzer and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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