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Hi, All!

Louvre robbery

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What we know about the evidence left at the scene of the Louvre jewel heist

"All criminals make mistakes," said a retired NYPD chief of detectives. ByBill
Hutchinson

As the hunt for the thieves who stole over $100 million worth of jewels from
the Louvre Museum in Paris stretched into its fifth day on Thursday, veteran
detectives who have probed similar cases said French investigators have a lot
of evidence to work with.

Chief among the clues police have recovered at the scene of Sunday's
sensational crime at one of the world's most famous museums are traces of DNA
found on items the thieves left behind in their hasty motorbike getaway.

"That's a tremendous piece of evidence to have recovered, to actually have
DNA," Geoffrey Kelly, a retired FBI agent who was on the bureau's art crime
team, told ABC News. "We've always typically thought of fingerprints as the
way to catch bad guys, but DNA is really 21st-century technology."

The DNA, which investigators are analyzing and hope will lead to the identity
of the brazen thieves, was found in one of the helmets and one of the gloves
the thieves used in the robbery, French police in charge of the heist
investigation told ABC News.

Kelly said French detectives are likely running the DNA traces through law
enforcement DNA databases to look for a match.

"If it were here in the States, we would certainly be running the DNA through
what we call the CODIS database, which is a database of all collected DNA
samples," Kelly said.

The CODIS database is maintained by the FBI, but the DNA available to
investigators is mostly of people convicted of crimes or who have been
reported missing.

"If that didn't work, then we would go to investigative genealogy, where we
would actually be using commercial DNA databases and running the DNA evidence
collected through these databases to try and find a match. If not direct, then
maybe second, third or fourth generation."

Robert Boyce, the retired chief of detectives for the New York Police
Department, said the genetic evidence obtained in the Louvre case can also be
run through the DNA database of Interpol, the world's largest international
police organization headquartered in Lyon, France.

Even if the perpetrators have no previous criminal history in which they were
required to submit DNA samples, Boyce said the evidence can still be used once
an arrest is made to place the suspects at the scene of the crime.

Boyce, an ABC News contributor, noted that Luigi Mangione, the suspect in the
Dec. 4, 2024, fatal shooting in midtown Manhattan of UnitedHealthcare CEO
Brian Thompson, had no previous criminal record that would have required him
to submit his DNA.

But once Mangione was caught, a candy bar wrapper and a water bottle that
police collected as evidence allegedly placed Mangione at the crime scene
because they contained traces of his DNA, according to prosecutors.

"Once you identify a suspect, it will put him or her right there at the
scene," Boyce said.

French police said the Louvre jewel thieves also left behind a stolen truck
with a mechanical cherry picker mounted to it that the perpetrators used to
reach the second-floor window leading to the Apollo Gallery they targeted.

Also collected as evidence at the crime scene was a blanket, two angle
grinders used to cut through the window of the gallery and the display cases
inside, a walkie-talkie, gasoline and a blowtorch, as well as the glove and
helmet that contained the DNA.

"It's all critical," Boyce said. "Anything you find at a crime scene... that's
going to help you in the long run with this case."

He said the stolen truck with the cherry picker mounted to it could turn out
to be a key piece of evidence once police determine the location it was taken
from.

"The tools they left at the scene, they knew they were going to leave at the
scene. So they didn't really care," Boyce said.

Boyce said investigators will likely look for security video in the vicinity
of where the truck was taken.

"You do your video searches before the perp gets to the scene," Boyce said.
"So, you want to find video showing that cherry picker, where that was, and
see if you can develop any evidence from that before they get to the scene,
because that's when their guard is down. They think they're not being watched."

Another key piece of video that investigators are closely analyzing is one
that law enforcement sources told ABC News was taken from inside the museum by
Louvre security and captures two of the thieves exiting the museum on the
mobile cherry picker and fleeing on motorbikes with the loot.

Boyce said the other pieces of evidence collected at the scene can also be
crucial, particularly if the thieves purchased the items at a store.

"I had cases where the perpetrators went to a Home Depot to buy their tools,"
Boyce said.

Boyce said the Louvre heist was "audacious and shows you the level of detail
they went to."

"They practiced this," Boyce said.

However, Boyce added, "All criminals make mistakes, all of them. And it's up
to us, the investigators, to find those mistakes."

https://abcnews.go.com/International/evidence-left-scene-louvre-
ewel-heist/story?id=126812677
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PS: Clean job ;-)

Bye, All!
Alexander Koryagin

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