As the Louvre Museum in Paris, France suffered its biggest theft in 114 years, attention is turning to the global black market where the stolen relics are likely to flow. Foreign media said the items stolen this time could be traded relatively easily on the black market.
On the 20th (local time), The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported, "After thieves stole eight jewels of the French royal family, the chase began before they could flow onto the black market," and added, "The biggest concern is that these historic artifacts could be dismantled and sold off in parts."
Earlier on the 19th at 9:30 a.m., a four-person gang smashed a window with a chainsaw, broke into the "Apollo Gallery," and finished the heist in seven minutes. They stole an emerald and diamond necklace Napoleon I gave to Empress Marie Louise, a brooch of Empress Eugénie, wife of Napoleon III, and sapphire necklaces related to Queen Marie-Amélie and Queen Hortense in the 18th century.
Léliane Scordino, former Paris bureau chief of The New York Times (NYT) and author of "Adventures at the Louvre: How to fall in love with the world's largest museum," told the BBC, "Those jewels could be taken apart, they could be cut up, and they could be sold on the black market," adding, "The likelihood that they will all be recovered in their current form is low."
According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the international black market for stolen art is worth billions of dollars every year. The black market stretches worldwide, from diamond-cutting workshops in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Delhi, India, to jewelers in New York, Antwerp, and Tel Aviv.
Unlike a Picasso painting or a Rolex watch, stolen jewels can be separated from their settings or have the gold mountings melted down and sold for the value of the metal and stones themselves, WSJ explained. If the jewels are dismantled, their meaning as "priceless heritage" would be lost, but depending on the quality of the natural stones, they could fetch high prices in black market transaction.
Moreover, the stolen jewels were made in the 19th century, making them difficult to trace. Christopher Marinello, founder of Art Recovery International, a firm specializing in recovering artworks, said, "Newly made jewels or synthetic gems have microscopic serial numbers engraved on them, but older jewels have no such identifying marks," adding, "It is far better than getting caught hiding a Picasso under the bed to melt the gold, separate the stones, sew them into a jacket, and take them to a shady jeweler."
Given the nature of black markets where crime revenue is transaction, it is hard for perpetrators to reap big profits, but jewels are known to carry higher value than artworks on the black market. Stolen artworks are registered in international databases, but no such management system exists for jeweled artifacts. In addition, jewel theft carries relatively lighter penalties compared with violent crimes.
Recently, thefts of jewelry, which can be disposed of more easily than artworks, have been on the rise. In Sep., about 600,000 euros worth of mineral rough stones were stolen from the Paris Museum of Natural History, and those, too, were likely transaction on the black market. Tobias Kormind, head of the online jeweler "77 Diamonds," said, "As the price of gold has risen 60% over the past year, the temptation to steal gold or shiny objects from museums has grown."
Experts analyzed that the Louvre thieves were likely first-time offenders. Among the stolen items, Empress Eugénie's tiara was found broken near the scene, believed to have been dropped as the thieves fled. Anthony Roman, a private investigator with experience in art-crime investigations, said, "Given that they abandoned such a valuable tiara, they are not professionals."