Paris Metro station heist sees thieves steal €300,000 of gems from Indian dealers

Two diamond dealers from India were attacked with tear gas and robbed at a Paris Metro station, with the thieves making off with a briefcase full of the precious jewels worth around €300,000.

Published: 2 March 2018 10:05 CET

Paris Metro station heist sees thieves steal €300,000 of gems from Indian dealers

Photos: AFP/TVZ Design, Flickr

It sounds like a story worthy of a Hollywood heist movie.

The two diamond traders from India had been in the 10th arrondissement of Paris to sell the case of precious stones worth an estimated €300,000.

However when the deal did not go ahead they decided to make their way back to their hotel on the Metro along with the stones, according to French press reports.

But the thieves had other plans.

When the traders got to the turnstiles at Cadet Metro station in the 9th arrondissement of the French capital which is home to many diamond dealers, the two Indian nationals were attacked with tear gas by the two men.

After a quick scramble, one of the attackers managed to seize the briefcase and its precious contents, before fleeing the scene with his accomplice, according to French press reports.

After the incident which took place on Monday February 26th at around 4pm the dealers filed a complaint.

According to reports, “The thieves were perfectly informed about the route of the two diamond dealers and had prepared their hit perfectly.”

“The two traders were coming back from a business meeting and were attacked Monday afternoon by two men,” a source told AFP, confirming a report by French magazine Le Point.

“A bag containing several precious stones — but no diamonds — was stolen,” the source added. “Early indications are that it could have been a
premeditated attack.”

The French capital has seen a number of high-profile jewel robberies in the past few years, most recently an audacious heist at the Ritz hotel in January.

A gang armed with hatchets and handguns burst into the five-star hotel and smashed the windows of jewellery shops on the ground floor, but became trapped by locked doors as they tried to flee.

Three men have been charged over the robbery.

In October 2016, US reality TV star Kim Kardashian was tied up and robbed at gunpoint while staying in a luxury residence for Paris Fashion Week.

The thieves made off with jewellery worth at least nine million euros, including a ring worth four million dollars alone.

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“National police in Rouen neutralised early this morning an armed individual who clearly wanted to set fire to the city’s synagogue,” Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

Police responded at 6.45 am to reports of “fire near the synagogue”, a police source said.

A source close to the case told AFP the man “was armed with a knife and an iron bar, he approached police, who fired. The individual died”.

“It is not only the Jewish community that is affected. It is the entire city of Rouen that is bruised and in shock,” Rouen Mayor Nicolas Mayer-Rossignol wrote on X.

He made clear there were no other victims other than the attacker.

Two separate investigations have been opened, one into the fire at the synagogue and another into the circumstances of the death of the individual killed by the police, Rouen prosecutors said.

Such an investigation by France’s police inspectorate general is automatic whenever an individual is killed by the police.

The man threatened a police officer with a knife and the latter used his service weapon, said the Rouen prosecutor.

The dead man was not immediately identified, a police source said.

Asked by AFP, the National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office said that it is currently assessing whether it will take up the case.

France has the largest Jewish community of any country after Israel and the United States, as well as Europe’s largest Muslim community.

There have been tensions in France in the wake of the October 7th attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas on Israel, followed by the Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip.

Red hand graffiti was painted onto France’s Holocaust Memorial earlier this week, prompted anger including from President Emmanuel Macron who condemned “odious anti-Semitism”.

“Attempting to burn a synagogue is an attempt to intimidate all Jews. Once again, there is an attempt to impose a climate of terror on the Jews of our country. Combating anti-Semitism means defending the Republic,” Yonathan Arfi, the president of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions of France (CRIF). wrote on X.

France was hit from 2015 by a spate of Islamist attacks that also hit Jewish targets. There have been isolated attacks in recent months and France’s security alert remains at its highest level.