‘Brazen’ Louvre thieves made targeted heist, treasures could be melted down: expert

The gang of thieves who robbed the Louvre Museum on Sunday and made off with some of France’s most famous crown jewels might end up melting their loot down, an ex-FBI art crime expert said.

Tim Carpenter also suggested the team of robbers behind the “shocking” operation were focused on treasures of immense cultural and historical value.

“This was a targeted heist,” Carpenter told Fox News Digital.

“They knew precisely what they were going for, and they understood the value and the cultural significance of these pieces,” he continued. “They also understood that this was extraordinarily important to the people of France.”

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Also “shocking,” Carpenter noted, “is that it was a daytime robbery while the museum was open.”

The Louvre was forced to close its doors following the daring morning theft, which happened in under seven minutes and left police racing to recover the jewels.

The raid, at around 9:30 a.m. local time, targeted the museum’s Apollo Gallery, home to historic treasures linked to Napoleon and Empress Eugénie.

The crew reportedly stole a crown believed to have belonged to Empress Eugénie, Le Parisien reported. 

According to The Associated Press, eight objects were taken, including a sapphire diadem, necklace and single earring from a matching set linked to 19th-century French queens Marie-Amélie and Hortense.

An emerald necklace and earrings from the matching set of Empress Marie-Louise were also reportedly snatched alongside a reliquary brooch, Empress Eugénie’s diadem and her large corsage-bow brooch.

“They could be melted down or pieced out,” Carpenter explained. “They’ll punch stones out of the crowns, and they’ll cut the stones, and they’ll market them individually.”

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According to French daily Le Parisien, the thieves, two of whom were disguised as construction workers, entered the museum after parking next to it. They extended a lift to a first-floor window and smashed it open with an angle grinder.

The time “is when the museum is kind of its most chaotic. People are getting settled,” added Carpenter.

“They breached through a window and made this really brazen. These guys are fast and moving quickly with a purpose, and they breach, and they get in there really quickly,” he added.

After the heist, Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez spoke to radio station France Inter and said the thieves “entered from the outside using a basket lift” and “a disc cutter” to slice through glass panes containing precious jewels.

“The investigation has begun, and a detailed list of the stolen items is being compiled,” the ministry also said in a statement. “Beyond their market value, these items have inestimable heritage and historical value.”

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“Because it’s a historic building, there are just natural vulnerabilities that occur, and these guys just found one of those and found a way to exploit it,” Carpenter said.

“That is definitely a risk,” he continued. “When you look at a building like the Louvre… there always has to be a balance.”

“I think the local authorities there have a very strong chance of doing a really effective criminal investigation, identifying these perpetrators and hopefully recovering these pieces before they’re lost to us,” concluded Carpenter.

Fox News Digital reached out to the Louvre Museum for comment.