The Louvre has reopened just three days after considered one of the highest-profile museum thefts of the century that stunned the world.
Thieves slipped out and in of the museum in a brazen daylight heist that lasted lower than eight minutes on Sunday, stealing eight items from two high-security display cases, the Ministry of Culture confirmed.
The robbery, which took place steps from the Mona Lisa and involved items valued at greater than $100 million, has put France’s President Emmanuel Macron and Louvre chief Laurence des Cars under fresh scrutiny. It comes just months after the museum’s employees went on strike, warning of chronic understaffing and under-resourced protections, with too few eyes on too many rooms.
Latest details on the investigation
Prosecutor Laure Beccuau said expert analyses are underway and that 4 people have been identified partaking within the robbery. The prosecutor added that a team of about 100 investigators have been assigned to the crime, and authorities are analyzing fingerprints discovered at thescene.
Detectives are continuing to investigate video camera footage from across the museum in addition to fundamental highways in Paris for signs of the robbers, who escaped on motorbikes.
The jewels remain missing and the thieves are still at large after they used a powered, extendable ladder to get into the second-floor Galerie d’Apollon (Apollo’s Gallery) housing the crown jewels, officials said.
The intruders forced open a window, cut panes with a disc cutter and went straight for the glass display cases, officials said.
The heist took place about half-hour after the museum opened, with visitors already inside, and unfolded just 250 metres from the famed Mona Lisa.
Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said the crew entered from outside using a cherry picker via the riverfront facade to succeed in the hall with the 23-item royal collection.
The thieves smashed two display cases with an angle grinder and fled on motorbikes, Nunez said. Alarms brought Louvre agents to the room, forcing the intruders to bolt, however the theft was already done.
Beccuau said that the thieves threatened museum guards with the angle grinder they used to interrupt into the jewellery cases before they fled.
Jewels stolen price greater than $100 million
Beccuau valued the haul at about €102 million, a “spectacular” figure that also fails to capture the works’ historical weight.
Thieves stole eight items from two high-security display cases, including pieces that belonged to Empress Marie-Louise, who was the wife of French Emperor Napoleon I, and others that belonged to Empress Eugénie, the wife of Napoleon III.
She warned the thieves could be unlikely to get anything near that sum in the event that they pry out stones or melt the metals — a fate curators fear would pulverize centuries of meaning into anonymous gems for the black market.
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“We will perhaps hope that they’ll take into consideration this and won’t destroy these jewels without rhyme or reason,” she said.
“It will be important to keep in mind that this damage is an economic damage, however it is nothing in comparison with the historical damage brought on by this theft,” Beccuau said in an interview with RTL radio.
Thieves attempted to steal Empress Eugénie’s emerald-set imperial crown, containing greater than 1,300 diamonds, however it was later found outside the museum, French authorities said. It was reportedly recovered broken.
This picture shows the crown of the Empress of the French Eugénie de Montijo displayed at Apollon’s Gallery on January 14, 2020, on the Louvre museum in Paris after the reopening of the Gallery following 10 months of renovations.
STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN/AFP via Getty Images
The French government is not going to be compensated for the stolen art. Those at private museums in Paris are frequently covered by private insurance, a government spokesperson said Tuesday, in response to the Latest York Times. But within the case of the Louvre, “that state acts as its own insurer.”
The pieces weren’t insured, in response to France’s culture ministry, which it says isn’t unusual “given the associated fee of taking out insurance” and the proven fact that “the accident rate is low.”
The Louvre’s management defended the standard of the display cases that housed the stolen jewels.
“The Louvre Museum affirms that the display cases installed in December 2019 represented a substantial step forward when it comes to security, given the degree of obsolescence of the old equipment, which might have led, without alternative, to the works being faraway from public view,” the management team told AFP.
Questions on Louvre’s security overhaul
The Louvre’s director Laurence des Cars faced questioning by a cultural committee on the French Senate on Wednesday amid questions over the safety on the world’s most visited museum.
A couple of minutes before the hearing, Jacques Grosperrin, vice-president of the Senate’s culture committee, said they’d be asking des Cars why she desired to resign following the aftermath of the heist.
“Why did she need to resign? I understand that she submitted her resignation to the Minister of Culture, who refused it. If she desired to resign, it was because she felt responsible, guilty, I don’t know, but responsible,” he said, before adding, “I believe she must have asked the Minister of Culture for her resignation.”
Des Cars, the primary woman to steer the Louvre since May 2021, began her speech by saying that she “desired to re-establish some truths.”
“I even have faced all my responsibilities. I even have seen my name thrown to the wolves, I even have seen malicious press articles spread and false information flourish,” she said, in response to the newspaper Le Parisien.
She confirmed that she had submitted her resignation to the Minister of Culture, which was declined.
“Last Sunday, after having observed alongside the Minister of Culture and the Minister of the Interior the results of the terrible attack we had just suffered, I offered my resignation to the Minister of Culture. She refused,” des Cars revealed.
Laurence des Cars, director of Le Louvre museum, poses before a hearing on the Culture commission of the Senate, three days after historic jewels were stolen in a daring daylight heist, Wednesday, Oct. 22, 2025 in Paris.
AP Photo/Emma Da Silva
She went on to say that she desired to “provide objective and well-founded insights into the protection of the collections house within the Louvre.”
“Despite our efforts, despite our exertions day by day, we now have been defeated,” she said, adding that since 2021, she has continued to “draw the eye of our national representation and the media to the state of degradation and general obsolescence of the Louvre, its constructing and its infrastructure.”
She also explained that the museum’s security relies on equipment, “but these resources should not enough without trained teams and well-applied procedures.”
“On this subject, over the past 10 years, the museum has seen a decline in its surveillance and security staff. Under my presidency, these staff numbers haven’t decreased. Since 2022, they’ve increased by 5.5 per cent, ” she added.
Des Cars said that in Sunday’s robbery, Louvre agents “weren’t armed” and that they “followed the safety protocol with responsiveness, precision and composure.”
“Due to their professionalism, nobody was injured. On this nightmare, no human life was affected,” she added.
Minister of Culture Rachida Dati told France’s National Assembly that there had been no failure within the museum’s security arrangements.
“The Louvre Museum is way more than the most important museum on this planet. It’s the showcase of French culture and our shared heritage,” she said.
“The Louvre’s security measures weren’t faulty, that’s a fact. The Louvre Museum’s security measures worked,” she said, adding that she launched an administrative investigation “which can provide a totally transparent account of the events that occurred last Sunday.”
Macron urged ministers to make sure security was tightened on the Louvre after the thieves snatched the jewels.
In a cupboard meeting, the president said “security measures were being deployed for the Louvre and requested a speeding up of those measures,” France 24 reports.
All this comes after Macron announced recent measures in January for the Louvre — complete with a brand new command post and expanded camera grid that the culture ministry says is being rolled out.
In June, a staff walkout over overcrowding and chronic understaffing delayed the opening. Unions argue that mass tourism has resulted in 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. However the Apollo Gallery housing the Crown Diamonds stayed sealed, with a folding screen obscuring the doorway on the gallery’s rotunda entrance.
— With files from The Associated Press