Robbers in drag net $100 million in Paris heist

Robbers in drag net $100 million in Paris heist

www.msnbc.msn.com

PARIS - Armed robbers — some dressed in drag — made off with $100 million in loot from a lightning-fast jewelry store theft in central Paris, in what police Friday called one of France's costliest jewel heists.

Three or four thieves swiped rings, necklaces and luxury watches from display cases at the Harry Winston store near the Champs-Elysees, a police official said. They brandished handguns and threatened about 15 employees, hitting some on the head with guns, the official said.

At least two of the bandits were men wearing wigs and dressed as women, at times spoke a foreign language, and knew employees' names, the official said. After the theft, the robbers fled.

The official, who was not authorized to be publicly named according to agency policy, said it was among France's biggest-ever jewel thefts.

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[edit on 6-12-2008 by grover]

Gotta watch those drag queens they're serious about their bling.

What I am curious about though is that in these days of microchiping and etching... how are they going to be able to unload this stuff safely...

Also what the hell is $100 million of anything doing in one store anyway?

Isn't that just asking for it?

www.msnbc.msn.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

the real problem wll be to sell those stones unless its some syndicate job

reply to post by Fett Pinkus


That's what I was thinking... all that high end stuff has laser etching to identify it and probably micro-chips as well... so they are not going to be able to unload it easily unless it was a private job.

The article says there was a similar job at the same place last year...

The store was targeted in a similar theft in October 2007, when three people forced employees to open safes and hand over euro10 million worth of jewels.

A security monitoring group for the French jewelry industry has reported a 20 percent rise in armed robberies this year over last, with 132 incidents in the first 11 months of 2008.

[edit on 6-12-2008 by grover]

Originally posted by grover
reply to post by Fett Pinkus

 

That's what I was thinking... all that high end stuff has laser etching to identify it and probably micro-chips as well... so they are not going to be able to unload it easily unless it was a private job.

The article says there was a similar job at the same place last year...

The store was targeted in a similar theft in October 2007, when three people forced employees to open safes and hand over euro10 million worth of jewels.

A security monitoring group for the French jewelry industry has reported a 20 percent rise in armed robberies this year over last, with 132 incidents in the first 11 months of 2008.

[edit on 6-12-2008 by grover]

Kinda far-fetched but what if this is nothing more than some sort of insurance scam perpetrated by Harry Winston? It seems odd that the store would keep that much merchandise in their store unless A) It was insured and/or B) Harry Winston was very confident that their store wouldn't be the target of a robbery.

We know that it can't be B) because, as Grover pointed out, Harry Winston was the victim of a similar heist just last year