Multiple people have now been arrested over a jewellery heist at Paris’s famed Louvre Museum.
However, the lavish jewels that once adorned France’s royals are still missing.
In the days after the heist, experts warned that the jewels – which are valued at more than €88 million (£77.5 million) – could be melted down or broken into parts. If that is done successfully, the smaller pieces could go up for sale as part of a new necklace or earrings without turning too many heads, some say.
“You don’t even have to put them on a black market, you just put them in a jewellery store,” said Erin Thompson, an art crime professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York.
“It could be sold down the street from the Louvre.”
Ms Thompson and others said that this has become increasingly common with stolen jewels and metal goods, and is a way that thieves can try to cover their tracks.
The step would be crucial, as “everyone and their sister” has seen photos of the stolen artefacts over the past week – so finding a market to sell them intact would be incredibly difficult, said Christopher Marinello, a lawyer and founder of Art Recovery International.
French prosecutor Laure Beccuau made a plea on Wednesday to whoever has the jewels.
“These jewels are now, of course, unsellable … Anyone who buys them would be guilty of concealment of stolen goods,” she warned.
“There’s still time to give them back.”
“By breaking them apart, they will hide their theft,” Mr Marinello said, adding that these items could become even more “traceless” if they are taken out of France and through jewel cutters and robust supply chains in other countries.
Still, such pieces are often sold for a fraction of the value of what was stolen, partly due to their smaller size, but also because melting or breaking down high-profile items removes the historical worth.
It isn’t a simple process.
“The real art in an art heist isn’t the stealing, it’s the selling,” explained Robert Wittman, former senior investigator of the FBI’s art crime team.
