Sunday, October 19, 2025, around 9:30 a.m., eight jewels vanish from the Apollo Gallery at the Louvre. A week later, on Saturday, October 25 around 10 p.m., the BRB, with the BRI and the OCBC, apprehend two suspects at Roissy and in Seine-Saint-Denis. Under the authority of Laure Beccuau, video surveillance and about 150 traces guide the investigation; the damage is estimated at €88 million. Access by crane, broken display cases; Artifact recovery: Eugénie’s crown, recovered, is damaged. Beyond the incident, the major issue remains the protection of inalienable heritage.
Arrests by Paris police, Saturday night
At Roissy–Charles-de-Gaulle, on Saturday, October 25, 2025, around 10 p.m., the pale neon lights fix on a face drawn from the crowd. A check, a passport, a piece of luggage. The journey will not take place. The Paris Banditry Repression Brigade closes the net. Additionally, it is supported by the Research and Intervention Brigade. Finally, the Central Office for the Fight against Trafficking in Cultural Goods also participates. At the same time, in Seine-Saint-Denis, another man is apprehended. Both are taken into custody. The Paris prosecutor, Laure Beccuau, confirms it: the investigation into the theft of the eight jewels committed a week earlier at the Louvre Museum has just reached a milestone.
The investigators prioritize silent efficiency. The arrests are not an end but a relay. Several services coordinate, each in its specialty: the BRB for tracking major banditry, the BRI for interception support, the OCBC for intelligence on works and networks. The prosecution mentions material and digital evidence. Furthermore, it relies on a network of patient images. Additionally, fingerprint and DNA profiles are used. Nothing at this stage allows for a conclusion. The presumption of innocence is not a procedural ornament; it regulates the very breathing of the case.
The morning of the theft: a backward narrative
On Sunday, October 19, 2025, a little before 9:30 a.m., the Apollo Gallery, the luminous heart of the palace, awakens under the gilding. A few minutes are enough. Silhouettes reach a technical exit. Then, they rise using a crane or a freight elevator. They force an opening and break display cases with portable power tools. The alarm goes off, the cameras observe, the perpetrators are already vanishing. The escape is as swift as the attack. On the way out, in the rush, a symbol topples: the crown of Empress Eugénie falls, leaving on the marble the damaged gleam of a century.
A few hours later, the entire country discovers the extent of the loss. What was taken does not belong to luxury, but to history. The desecrated display cases did not contain contemporary high jewelry; they exhibited fragments of national identity, traces of power, entire lines of memory.
The stolen pieces and their heritage value
In total, eight pieces from the 19th century disappear. Among them, elements of the sapphire set associated with Hortense de Beauharnais and then with Marie-Amélie, kept at the Louvre and presented in the Apollo Gallery. The damage is estimated at €88 million on the museum’s side. However, this sum only imperfectly captures the symbolic density of these objects. Eugénie’s crown was recovered after its fall, damaged by the brutal escape.
These stones and settings are not mere adornments. They connect reigns, exiles, and rebirths. They speak of the diplomacy of salons, the making of representation, politics through jewelry. An Apollo Gallery always tells more than its sparkle. Behind the display cases, there are biographies and inventory registers, family transmissions and public acquisitions. These are inalienable works, linked to the public domain by their status. That is why their loss, even temporary, is painful.
A meticulous investigation: images and traces
Over the hours, the Louvre’s video surveillance traces a path. Investigators follow a precise route from the palace’s surroundings to the museum’s floors. Then, they head into the city’s shadows. The sequences respond to each other, blind spots filled, silhouettes stabilized. The BRB quietly directs this patient reconstruction; the BRI stands ready, the OCBC illuminates what makes sense for a receiver. Scientifically, about one hundred and fifty DNA and fingerprint samples are exploited.
A museum heist requires relays. The fencing of works of this nature is a perilous and often poorly informed art. Fictional clichés forget the most important: the more famous the object, the less it sells. Organized crime knows this and sometimes diverts these pieces for use as collateral or exchange. Here, the media frenzy, international emotion, and police mobilization make any discreet exit even more improbable. The dismantling of such well-documented pieces remains a risk, but it is not straightforward. The recovery of the damaged crown reminds us that an improvised escape is the enemy of the perfect plan.
The hours after: timeline of a pursuit
Sunday, October 19, partial closure, initial findings, seizure of recordings. Monday, requisitions, expert assessments, cross-references. Wednesday, first consolidated material leads. Saturday, October 25, coordinated arrests, one at Roissy, the other in Seine-Saint-Denis. The prosecution sticks to the essentials: two men, links to examine, phones to extract, movements to reconstruct. The hearings follow one another, the searches yield objects, sometimes tiny, that feed the evidentiary mosaic.
It is reported that a departure for Algeria was imminent for one. Additionally, a plan to flee to Mali is mentioned for the other. These elements, public because cited by police and judicial sources, outline intentions more than they indicate guilt. The procedure will follow its logic: custody, possible indictments, control by a judge of liberties. The competent JIRS could be seized if the criminal association and the international dimension are confirmed.
Museum security and emergency plan: flaws and routines
Each break-in reveals the secret geography of a place. The Apollo Gallery is not just a backdrop. It combines the attendance of a world-renowned museum with the constraints of conservation. Moreover, it integrates a network of technical accesses and adapts to the habits of a living building. The heist of October 19 forces a revisit of protocols within the Vigipirate plan. What routes were possible? What alarm redundancies did not produce the expected reactions? Did the rounds intersect with the risk? The answers will be technical and slow, as they concern not only the Louvre; they affect the security of all museums, at a time when resources, markets, maintenance, and subcontracting add up and respond to each other.
The question is not to designate, too early, convenient culprits. It is to understand how professionals managed to exploit the interstices of a system. The imitation effect is never to be excluded after a spectacular coup. Therefore, a clear emergency plan must be activated: access, surveillance, response times, display case anchors, and alert protocol. Public communication also adjusts: to say without weakening, to name without indicating still open flaws.
What a fallen crown reveals
Much has been said about the boldness, less about the fragility. The crown that slips, hits, deforms, says more than the feat. It highlights that the material of these works consists of metals, stones, and soldering. Consequently, the violence of a gesture is enough to degrade them. A repaired crown never quite regains its voice. Heritage is a delicate organism; each repair, each reconstruction adds a layer to its history. It is also this irreversibility that justifies the judicial and technical determination of these hours.
The stakes, beyond the incident
The temptation is great to tell a heist of the century. Reality is more austere. It speaks of procedures, chains of evidence, police coordination, funds to secure. What is at stake goes beyond a museum: it is how a nation protects what it considers common. France has a long history of stolen works, and the memory of restitutions fuels the calm optimism of professionals. What remains is patience, and the will not to yield to shock or emphasis.
While two men answer the questions of investigators, restorers measure the wound of a fallen crown. In parallel, curators rewrite a risk map, and magistrates order new actions. The news will fade; the case will continue its course, between technical police work and restoration. The final word will belong to the evidence and the workshops, when, under the Apollo vaults, a display case will close again. Thus, it will preserve the thread of history intact.