The Louvre reopens 3 days after thieves took French crown jewels in daylight heist

Hundreds queued outside as barriers came down, a visible coda to three days of forensic work, inspections and staff briefings. Tuesday’s closure was routine; the museum is normally shut that day.

However, the scene of the heist — the jewel-lined Apollo Room — stayed shuttered.

France acknowledges failings

Authorities say the gang spent less than four minutes inside the Louvre. Using a freight lift wheeled to the Seine-facing façade, the thieves forced a window, smashed two display cases and fled on motorbikes into central Paris.

Alarms drew Louvre agents to the gallery, forcing the intruders to bolt — but the theft was already done.

“We have failed,” Justice Minister Gérald Darmanin said, noting criminals were easily “able to place a freight lift on a public way” — a breach that projects “a very negative image of France.”

Eight objects were taken: a sapphire diadem, necklace and single earring from a set linked to 19th-century queens Marie-Amélie and Hortense; an emerald necklace and earrings tied to Empress Marie-Louise, Napoleon Bonaparte’s second wife; a reliquary brooch; Empress Eugénie’s diamond diadem; and her large corsage-bow brooch — an imperial ensemble of rare craftsmanship.

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.

Fears the jewels will be destroyed

The haul is valued at about €88 million ($102 million) — a “spectacular” figure that fails to capture the works’ historical weight, according to Prosecutor Laure Beccuau.

She warned the thieves would be unlikely to realize anything close to that figure if they pry out the gems from their settings or melt the metals. Many curators fear exactly that: that an object’s centuries of meaning could be pulverized into anonymous gems for the black market.

The in-and-out took only minutes; no arrests have been announced and the jewels remain missing.

The investigation is widening. Beccuau said four people have been identified as being at the scene of the heist, with expert analyses underway and about 100 investigators mapping the crew and any accomplices.

The theft has sharpened scrutiny of the Louvre’s surveillance — and landed its president-director, Laurence des Cars, on Wednesday before the Senate’s culture committee — though top officials have refused to remove her.

Questions over Louvre's overhaul

All this comes in the middle of a security overhaul at the Louvre announced in January by President Emmanuel Macron’s government — a new command post and expanded camera grid the culture ministry says is being rolled out.

It raises hard questions, including whether Sunday’s breach is tied to staffing levels, and how uniformly the upgrades in the overhaul are being applied.

Protection for headline works is airtight — the Mona Lisa is behind bulletproof glass in a climate-controlled case — yet the break-in exposed seams elsewhere in a 33,000-object labyrinth. For many French, the contrast is a public embarrassment at the landmark.

There is also another raw nerve: swelling crowds and overstretched staff.

A June staff walkout delayed opening over overcrowding and chronic understaffing. Unions argue that mass tourism leaves too few eyes on too many rooms and creates pressure points where construction zones, freight access and visitor flows intersect.

On Wednesday, the Louvre’s other star attractions — from the Venus de Milo to the Winged Victory of Samothrace — were open again.

But the cordoned-off vitrines in the Apollo Room, guarded and empty, told a different story — one of a breach measured not just in minutes and euros, but in the fragility of a nation’s patrimony.