Robbery at the Louvre

 The BBC has an article about a recent heist at the Louvre museum in Paris.  The thieves entered through an upper window shortly after the museum opened for the day and stole some of what used to be the crown jewels of France.

France's ministry of culture said the stolen items were:

• A tiara and brooch belonging to Empress Eugénie, wife of Napoleon III
• An emerald necklace and a pair of emerald earrings from Empress Marie Louise
• A tiara, necklace and single earring from the sapphire set that belonged to Queen Marie-Amelie and Queen Hortense
• A brooch known as the "reliquary brooch"

Between them, these pieces are adorned with thousands of diamonds and other precious gemstones.

The CBC has more info:

The robbery, which took between six and seven minutes, was carried out by four people who were unarmed but who threatened the guards with angle grinders, she said.

The Globe and Mail also has an article but it might be paywalled.

Follow-up: The NYT has an article saying that there have been some arrests in the case!

Further follow-up: The Guardian has an article saying that the police claim the perpetrators were petty criminals rather than professionals.

SCUBA Diver Robs Floating Disney Restaurant

 Jalopnik has the story of a thief who swam underwater to a floating restaurant in Orlando, Florida and stole the day's proceeds.

The thief reportedly swam underwater to Paddlefish Restaurant in Disney Springs with the help of scuba gear, which also disguised his identity as he spray painted the restaurant's security cameras according to WFTV 9. He then ditched the gear, walked into the manager's office, and tied up the two workers who were counting the day's cash. He grabbed the haul, suited back up in his scuba gear, and made off into the water — all inside of two minutes.

Warhol Art Stolen

 The BBC reports that two works of art by Andy Warhol have been stolen from a museum in the Netherlands.

The Recovery of Ottawa's Missing Churchill Photo

 Several sites have articles about the recovery of the Karsh photo of Winston Churchill that was stolen from the Chateau Laurier hotel in Ottawa a few years ago.

The Ottawa Citizen has an overview which says that the photo will be back in the hotel within a month.

An article in the CBC identifies the thief and the buyer (who bought the photo at an auction and didn't know it was stolen).

The Toronto Star also has an article.

LA: Bank Robbery Capital of the World

 CrimeReads.com has an article about a period in the 1980s and 90s when there was an average of one bank robbery every hour in Los Angeles.

Between 1985 and 1995 the approximately 3,500 retail bank branches in the region were hit 17,106 times. 1992, the worst year of all, there was an almost unimaginable 2,641 heists, one every 45 minutes of each banking day. On a particularly bad day for the FBI that year, bandits committed 28 bank licks.

Toronto Airport Gold Heist

 The exact taken is unclear but a cargo container holding a large amount of gold was stolen from Toronto airport.  The BBC says $15 million while the CBC says $20 million.

Thieves use mini-drone to open bank door

 DroneDJ reports that thieves in Reims, France used a DJI mini-drone to open a door to an ATM lobby that couldn't otherwise be opened from outside.

What was strange about the crime was that the police found no trace of a break-in; neither the safe nor the entrance door of the premises showed any signs of vandalism.

When the CCTV footage of the ATM was reviewed, a mini drone was immediately detected. The video showed a skillfully piloted aircraft being used to trigger a push button that would open the door of a technical room next to the ATM.

The criminals got away with 150,000 Euros.

Interview with a getaway driver

 The Drive has an interview with former jewelry store robber and driver Larry Lawton (who seems to have a YouTube channel).  Lawton explains how to choose an appropriate getaway car.

All were simply rented from a company like Hertz under somebody else's name with Lawton listed as the co-driver. They were picked up as normal and simply returned when the job was done. Lawton and his accomplices would pay for the car, case the store they planned to rob, and then use it in the actual robbery.

Rédoine Faïd - French Escape Artist

 GQ magazine has a profile of Rédoine Faïd a French criminal and prison escapee who was inspired by crime movies.

A notorious thief—the architect of a flurry of dazzling heists and blockbuster robberies in the 1990s that targeted banks, jewelry stores, and armored cars—Faïd became more infamous still in 2013, when he blasted out of the Sequedin prison, near Lille, where he'd been serving time after a botched robbery, using smuggled explosives. 

Failed Texas Thieves Escape in Bayou Boat

 ABC13 reports that thieves tried to rob a museum in Royal Oaks, Texas.  After being discovered they fled in a bayou boat and then escaped into the city's storm drain system.

Followup: Illicit Cultural property also has a post on the failed heist with a few links to other articles.

via JRM

Obit: Murph the Surf

 The Los Angeles Times has the obituary of Jack Murphy (aka Murph the surf) a thief who in 1964 stole the Star of India from the American Museum of Natural History in New York.

Murphy is best known for a daring heist in 1964 at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, where he and other thieves used a bathroom window they had unlocked earlier to steal the famed Star of India sapphire — bigger than a golf ball — along with other precious gems.

Murphy was arrested a few days later and spent two years in prison for the heist.  The New York Times has a long article from 2019 about the robbery which has a number of pictures.

Murphy was a champion surfer before the heist and owned a surf shop in Florida.  

$1.1 Million in gold stolen from house near Belleville

Who says that you have to travel to an exotic location to pull off a major heist?  According to the Ottawa Citizen $1.1 million in gold was stolen from a house in eastern Ontario.

About $1.1 million in gold bars and coins and a further $4,000 in American currency were stolen, apparently in April, from a home in Cramahe Township. The rural municipality is between Brighton and Colborne.
“It’s kind of a bizarre situation,” said Northumberland OPP Const. Kimberly Johnston. “This type of theft is not something we come across every day.”

Vjeran Tomic, French catburglar

The Atlantic has a long article about Vjeran Tomic a French art thief.

Tomic generally worked alone, scaling walls, leaping between rooftops, and picking locks. Once inside an apartment, he looked first for jewelry, because it was valuable and easy to sell. A burglary that took less than two hours often yielded enough cash to support him for six months on the French Riviera. In his letters, he recounted robbing various Parisian luminaries, including the French-Caribbean singer Henri Salvador and the Egyptian royal family. 

Armoured car attacked by diggers

Boing Boing has a post - mostly a series of tweets with pictures - about an armoured car in Italy that was stopped by thieves and then ripped open with two diggers.  They got away with over 2 million Euros.

$100 million painting on back of bedroom door

Illicit Cultural Property has an article about a $100 million painting that was recovered after the death of a couple from New Mexico.  The painting was stolen, by an unknown couple, in 1985.

Also mentioned on Kottke.org

Theft of Swedish Crown Jewels

According to an article in the Ottawa Citizen (also Yahoo News and the BBC ) thieves smashed the case of a display holding the Swedish crown jewels and then fled the area in a waiting speedboat.

On Tuesday, two thieves stole one 17th century golden orb and two crowns from a cathedral near Stockholm where they had been on display in an alarm-locked glass box, before escaping by speedboat into the Mälaren lake that spans 120 kilometres and is filled with hundreds of small islands.

Houston Armoured Car Robbers

Texas Monthly has an article about the ringleader of a gang of Houston based armoured car robbers.

The gang were caught after police received, and paid for, an anonymous tip which named the leader.  The police then spent months following the gang members waiting for them to strike.  I think this illustrates the downside of the gang's particularly nasty technique of deliberately shooting the armoured car worker carrying the bags of money.

Convict escapes with tool dropped from drone

USA Today has an article about a criminal who escaped from prison using wire cutters dropped into the prison by a remote controlled drone.

via Slashdot

Hatton Garden ringleaders ordered to pay back

The BBC reports that the ringleaders of the gang that pulled the Hatton Garden heist have been ordered to repay GBP27.5m or spend more time in prison.

Ex-SAS robber caught because of dog hair

The Telegraph has an article about an ex-SAS soldier who was arrested for armed robbery after one of his dog's hairs was found at the scene.  I can see how they might not have covered that in special ops school.

The former special operations soldier, who was named locally as Derek, was held by gendarmes after detectives traced all Britons in the area who owned a Jack Russell, Le Parisien newspaper reported.