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France Charges Fourth Suspected Member Of Louvre Heist Gang

The four-person gang raided the world's most-visited art museum in broad daylight on October 19, , taking just seven minutes to steal jewellery worth an estimated $102 million before fleeing on scooters.

By Nosakhale Akhimien
Updated November 28, 2025
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French police officers stand next to a furniture elevator used by robbers to enter the Louvre Museum, on Quai Francois Mitterrand, in Paris on October 19, 2025. Robbers broke in to the Louvre and fled with jewellery on October 19, 2025 morning, a source close to the case said, adding that its value was still being evaluated. A police source said an unknown number of thieves arrived on a scooter armed with small chainsaws and used a goods lift to reach the room they were targeting. (Photo by Dimitar DILKOFF / AFP)

 

France on Friday charged the fourth alleged member of a gang arrested over last month’s spectacular jewel heist at the Louvre museum, prosecutors said.

On October 19, the four-person gang raided the world’s most-visited art museum in broad daylight, taking just seven minutes to steal jewellery worth an estimated $102 million before fleeing on scooters.

Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau described the fourth suspect as a 39-year-old man born in the working-class Paris suburb of Seine-Saint-Denis.

“Already convicted six times, this man was known to courts for various offences, such as pimping, driving without a licence, and receiving stolen goods,” Beccuau said in a statement.

He has been imprisoned pending trial.

READ ALSO: Louvre Heist A ‘Deafening Wake-Up Call’ For Museum Security, Says Auditor

The last suspected member of the gang was arrested on Tuesday at a construction site in the western French town of Laval, according to a source close to the case.

(FILES) This photograph shows the “parure de la reine Marie-Amelie et de la Reine Hortense” (set of jewelry of Queen Marie-Amelie and Queen Hortense) displayed at Apollon’s Gallery on January 14, 2020 at the Louvre museum in Paris after the reopening of the Gallery following ten months of renovations. (Photo by STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN / AFP)

The four suspects believed to have carried out the robbery have now been arrested and charged with organised theft and criminal conspiracy.

The stolen jewellery is still missing as well as those who ordered the theft.

Crown Jewels

 

The investigation is continuing to determine the precise role of each member of the gang, “as well as to clarify the conditions under which the theft was planned and carried out”, Beccuau said.

The thieves parked a truck with an extendable ladder below the museum’s Apollo Gallery housing the French crown jewels, clambered up, broke a window and used angle grinders to cut into glass display booths containing the treasures.

 

French police’s anti-gang unit BRB (Brigade de Repression du Banditisme) chief Paul Carreau, Paris State Prosecutor Laure Beccuau, Central Office for Combating Trafficking in Cultural Property (OCBC) chief Jean-Baptiste Felicite and Paris Deputy State Prosecutor Florent Boura give a press conference regarding the opening of a judicial investigation into the Louvre museum jewellry heist, in Paris on October 29, 2025. Photo by STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN / AFP

 

The other suspects already behind bars — men aged 35, 37 and 39 — are suspected of having been part of the four-person team.

Two of them are believed to have entered the Apollo Gallery, while the other two — including the one charged on Friday — remained outside before fleeing together.

Beccuau said in early November that the suspects were believed to be small-time criminals and not members of organised crime groups.

Earlier this week French daily Le Parisien said that one of the suspects said the gang had been hired by two men “with Slavic accents” who allegedly offered them a contract for a routine burglary.

The suspect claims he thought he was robbing a business office, the newspaper said.

The thieves dropped a diamond- and emerald-studded crown that once belonged to Empress Eugenie, the wife of Napoleon III, as they escaped.

(FILES) This picture shows the crown of the Empress of the French Eugénie de Montijo displayed at Apollon’s Gallery on January 14, 2020, at the Louvre museum in Paris after the reopening of the Gallery following ten months of renovations. (Photo by STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN / AFP)

 

But they made off with eight other items of jewellery, including an emerald-and-diamond necklace that Napoleon I gave his second wife, Empress Marie-Louise.

A 38-year-old woman who is the partner of one of the men is suspected of complicity. They have children together. The woman has been released on bail.

Louvre director Laurence des Cars last week promised more police and security cameras to prevent future thefts. She said around 20 “emergency” measures would be introduced, including officers being based “inside the Louvre” and 100 new security cameras around the museum.

 

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