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Louvre’s stolen jewels worth €88m, magistrate reveals

Jewels stolen from Paris’s Louvre Museum have been valued at approximately €88m, according to French magistrate Laure Beccuau

The stolen jewels include two tiaras, a necklace, two brooches and a pair of emerald earrings

Jewels stolen from Paris’s Louvre Museum earlier this week are estimated to be worth approximately €88m (US$102m, £76m), French magistrate Laure Beccuau has revealed.

The Napoleonic treasures were taken during a shocking heist on the morning of October 19, 2025, when thieves used a mechanical lift and power tools to scale the building and force entry into the museum’s Apollo Gallery through a window.

The perpetrators escaped with eight pieces, including an emerald necklace gifted by Napoleon to his second wife, Marie-Louise, Duchess of Parma, and a diamond crown that once belonged to Empress Eugénie, wife of Napoleon III.

According to various media reports, the crown, which contains almost 2,000 diamonds, was later recovered after being dropped by the culprits as they fled the scene.

The remaining missing pieces include two tiaras, a necklace, two brooches, a pair of emerald earrings, and a single earring from a set.

Beccuau confirmed that close to 100 investigators are working to locate the jewels, which are suspected to be part of a ‘material theft’, with authorities fearing that the pieces will be dismantled or melted down for their valuable materials.

“The wrongdoers who took these gems won’t earn €88m if they had the very bad idea of disassembling these jewels,” she told French broadcaster RTL.

“We can perhaps hope that they’ll think about this and won’t destroy them without rhyme or reason.”

The robbery took place on the morning of October 19, 2025   CREDIT: Musée du Louvre

Chris Marinello, chief executive of Art Recovery International, said the incident exposes growing vulnerabilities in the museum sector.

“If thieves can get into the Louvre, it shows how vulnerable our institutions have become. It’s a horrible time to be a museum,” he told The Guardian. “There’s a simple pattern here: smash, grab, and melt it down as quickly as possible.”

Lynda Albertson, chief executive of the Association for Research into Crimes against Art (ARCA), told The Guardian that selling the jewels intact would be nearly impossible.

“There’s no way to sell something as immediately identifiable as the Louvre’s jewels on the licit market,” she said.

“Even a private collector or auction house like Sotheby’s or Christie’s would want to see paperwork establishing proper ownership before touching such striking pieces.”

The theft has also called into question the Louvre’s security measures, with many questioning if the security cameras failed at the time of the robbery. French culture minister Rachida Dati, however, has confirmed that the museum’s security systems were fully functioning on the morning of October 19, 2025.

A full administrative inquiry has been launched, alongside the police investigation, to ensure transparency surrounding the incident.