New revelations have been made in France about the spectacular robbery of the Louvre in October last year. Officers arrived quickly on the scene, but did nothing. Guards wanted to intervene, but did nothing.
Source: AD.nl
On Sunday morning, October 19, 2025, Sofiane is on her bike to a forest on the outskirts of Paris to play a game of football with friends. As he cycles past the Louvre, he sees something strange. There is an aerial platform on the sidewalk next to the museum. On a Sunday. And strangely enough, the workers at that aerial platform wear motorcycle helmets.
Sofiane gets off, takes a photo with his phone and calls the police. Two men now use the aerial platform (shown in the photo below) onto a balcony of the Louvre, force a window and walk in with grinders.
But luckily Sofiane’s phone call quickly leads to results. Officers arrive in a car, drive at speed on a one-way road against traffic, race past the Louvre, approach the spot where the aerial platform is located and… just keep driving.
I didn’t dare
At that moment, the men with the grinders in the Apollo Gallery of the Louvre attack the display cases. Guard Ivan stands by, reacts coolly and wants to intervene. He grabs a barrier post in the hall, grabs it and… changes his mind. “I didn’t dare.”
While the police car drives on and Ivan’s knees are shaking, four men take off on scooters. The loot: crown jewels worth 88 million euros.
The scene is described in a book by three investigative journalists that is published today. They reconstructed “the crack of the century”. There is already so much attention for it that the film rights have now been sold to the famous director Romain Gavras. The book, ‘Main basse sur le Louvre’ (The plunder of the Louvre), reads like a thriller and painfully exposes where people have failed and why the crown jewels have never been recovered.
Minister, I am not about security. I’m talking about the invigilators
No central management
For example, a week after the robbery, the Minister of Culture called the head of security at the Louvre to ask for clarification. “Minister, I am not about security,” says the woman. To which the minister says: “Who are you then?” The answer: “I’m in charge of the invigilators.” To which the minister says in surprise: “Who is in charge of security?” And there lies the key, the three journalists write: “The security of the Louvre has no central management at all”
The book reconstructs how the police tracked down the perpetrators thanks to DNA traces and surveillance cameras. For example, images emerged from a parking garage in Aubervilliers, a banlieue north of Paris. One man takes Empress Eugénie’s diadem out of a bag, hands it to a second man, and then the jewelry, with 1,998 diamonds and 212 pearls, is placed visibly on the saddle of the scooter.
However, the police only discovered that parking garage after about two weeks. Only then could the images be viewed. The officers took stock on the spot, but it was too late. There were no more diadems, diamonds or pearls. “It was dusty and smelled of urine and there were only empty boxes.”
The four suspects who were arrested after the robbery are all petty criminals, but they form a colorful group
Street racer
The four suspects who were arrested after the robbery are all petty criminals, but they form a colorful group, the book shows. One of them is a star on social media as an illegal street racer. He also worked in the past as a security guard at the Pompidou Museum in Paris.
Another suspect suffers from Diogenes syndrome: in his house the floor was strewn with more than 30 centimeters of rubbish. A third suspect took a course after the Louvre robbery: he wanted to learn to operate an aerial work platform. The latter was a football referee.
At least two of them have confessed. But nothing has been found of the crown jewels, seven months after the “crack of the century”.
