French authorities have formally charged two more individuals in connection with the October 19, 2025 robbery of royal jewels from the Galerie d’Apollon at the Louvre Museum. Of the five people taken into custody on October 29, two face criminal charges; the other three have been released pending further investigation. 

The first of the newly charged suspects is a 38-year-old woman, indicted for “complicity in robbery committed by an organised gang” and “criminal association with a view to preparing the crime of robbery by an organised gang.” Presented to the court as "afraid" for her children and herself, through her attorney she has denied the charges. 

 The judge of freedoms and detention (JLD) ordered that she remain in custody for now, stating: 

“I do not rule out reassessing the situation, but I want the versions to be cross-checked. The ball is in the lady’s court. Her word will be decisive on the possibility of release under judicial supervision. If it does not lead to anything, we will draw conclusions.”

Paris public prosecutor Laure Beccuau revealed on November 2 that DNA recovered from the gondola lift used by the robbers matches the woman's genetic profile. 

The second suspect is a 37-year-old man, charged with “organised robbery and conspiracy to commit organised robbery.” He has requested a deferred hearing and remains in custody pending that session. Prosecutors say both of these suspects were previously known to law enforcement, as each had been tried together for a robbery in 2015, suggesting a prior relationship or at least collaboration in other criminal activity.

While still reeling from the Louvre jewel heist, a second high-profile daylight robbery occurred in the city of Lyon. 

Video footage published on the social media site X, taken by witnesses at around 2 p.m., from a neighbouring company shows multiple suspects, dressed in black coveralls with red arm bands, as the crime was getting underway.  Brandishing what appears to be military-grade weapons, the suspects can be seen calmly walking back and forth beside a white van equipped with a blue flashing light which they had parked outside the rear of the laboratory. 

One of the suspects can be seen calmly tossing a ladder over the fence while another detonates an explosive device, blowing out two security windows in the laboratory and injuring five employees. Witnesses reported hearing the explosions as well as possible shots fired from various locations in the district of Gerland, the 7th arrondissement along the River Rhône, where the business is located.

Once the thieves gained entry to the targeted building, the witness video shows one of the accomplices scaling the supplied ladder and throwing parcels back over the fence while another loaded a black case containing gold ingots into the vehicle before the thieves fled the scene. The delivery van was found burned less than two kilometres from the site of the robbery, where the perpetrators switched to a getaway car.

While the thieves may have thought they got away, driving back to a property in Vénissieux to divide the loot, officers of the Lyon (Rhône) Research and Intervention Brigade (BRI) were actually already on their tail. The investigative team had them under surveillance in relation to an earlier robbery that also involved explosives. Hours of surveillance and stakeouts in connection with the first theft and preplanning of this second assault, culminated in a search and seizure team being formed to enter  the property.

The police subsequently entered the home via the garage and found the five perpetrators in an apartment on the upper floors, some of whom had tried to escape via the balconies but were apprehended without shots being fired. One accomplice, a young woman suspected of having dropped off a lookout before the robbery, was also taken into custody. 

At the scene, police recovered weapons, detonators, armed explosive devices, a large sum of cash and the €12 million in gold stolen from the Laboratoire Pourquery.  An additional search of a storage unit in Décines led to the recovery of additional weapons, ammunition, a bulletproof vest and a money counter, which tends to indicate the payout for thefts the team was involved with were high.  

Of the suspects described, four are said to be seasoned criminals in their thirties and forties, including one who was already sentenced to ten years in prison for armed robbery. One was wanted in connection with the double murder of the Abdelli brothers, who were gunned down by a burst of automatic gunfire in February 2016 in the Buers district of Villeurbanne, a city bordering Lyon. The murdered brothers, Omar, 34, and Lakdar, 37, were implicated in a murky drug case dating back to December 2012, which is still under investigation.

I mention this non art-related crime here to show the high steaks involved in gold and jewellery thefts.  The criminals involved in these types of activities, risking long  incarcerations if caught, are not always the gentile Thomas Crowne Affair types portrayed in films.  

It is vital to remember that while much of the focus on these thedts falls on the dazzling value of the stolen objects, the jewel-encrusted tiaras, historic necklaces of French royalty, and the multi-million-euro losses, the real stakes in violent robberies includes more than just gold and jewellery. For museum staff and first-responder security guards and room watchers at institutions like the Louvre, their foremost responsibility has to be protecting human life. 

When criminal operations escalate, using heavy equipment, angle grinders, or sledge hammers while masquerading as legitimate workers, the threat they pose is real. A museum guard’s role is not only to safeguard art when and how they can but to prevent lives being harmed. These heists are not glamorous set-pieces from a film; they can also carry the potential for deadly violence. As we follow the investigations, the message must be clear: in high-stakes robberies such as these, vigilance, strong protocol and awareness that human safety comes first are not optional, they are imperative.

By.  Lynda Albertson