Prosecutor says no sign yet of jewels taken in Louvre robbery, as two suspects admit partial guilt

The Paris prosecutor said Wednesday that none of the French crown jewels stolen in the brazen daytime robbery of the landmark Louvre Museum had been located 10 days after the heist, and that the only two men detained so far in connection with the crime had partially admitted to a role in the theft.

“I want to remain hopeful that (the jewels) will be found and they can be brought back to the Louvre, and more broadly to the nation,” Paris Prosecutor Laure Beccuau told reporters.

She said the two suspects in custody were to be charged with theft and criminal conspiracy after “partially admitting to the charges.”

The jewels date back hundreds of years and are considered national treasures with an estimated value of some $102 million. Experts have told CBS News the elaborate pieces of jewelry may have already been broken down into their component parts, greatly diminishing their value, and they may never be found.

At least four people in total were seen on security camera video taking part in the robbery on Oct. 19, and Beccuau said at a news conference in the French capital on Wednesday afternoon that her office could not rule out the culprits being part of a larger criminal gang.

Dozens of detectives have been on the trail of the four thieves, who used a cherry-picker lift and cutting gear to break into a first-floor gallery at the world-renowned museum and then fled with the jewels.

But few details have emerged so far about how investigators have managed to track down the culprits, some of whom wore balaclavas and high-visibility vests.

The two men who were arrested Saturday in connection with the heist could be held only until Wednesday evening without being formally charged under French judicial rules, and Beccuau said they would be brought before magistrates with a view to “charging them with organized theft, which carries a 15-year prison sentence,” along with criminal conspiracy, punishable by 10 years. 

A source close to the case this weekend said the men in their 30s were known to the police for committing thefts, and Beccuau said they were believed to be the ones who actually broke into the museum gallery, based in part on DNA evidence.

The two men hailed from Seine-Saint-Denis, a region just outside Paris, and one was arrested as he was about to board a plane for Algeria, the source said, requesting anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the press.

After media reports of the detentions, Beccuau said authorities had “carried out arrests on Saturday evening,” and confirmed that “one of the men arrested was about to leave the country” from the capital’s Charles de Gaulle airport.