The Paris prosecutor announced four more arrests on Tuesday (November 25, 2025) in connection with the heist at the Louvre Museum in October by a gang that made off with $102 million worth of jewels.

The two men and two women taken into custody are from the Paris region and range in age from 31 to 40, said the prosecutor, Laure Beccuau, whose office is heading the investigation.

Her statement didn’t say what role they’re suspected of having played in the October 19 theft. Police can hold them for questioning for 96 hours.

French media report that one of those arrested, a 39-year-old already known to police services, is believed to be the fourth member of the team thought to have carried out the daring daylight robbery and is from Aubervilliers, a suburb north of Paris other suspects have connections with.

The other three alleged members of the so-called “commando” team have been previously arrested and face preliminary charges of theft by an organised gang and criminal conspiracy. Their DNA has been found on the scene or on items linked to the robbery.

A woman arrested in October is accused of complicity.

The loot hasn’t been recovered. It includes a diamond-and-emerald necklace Napoleon gave to Empress Marie-Louise, jewels tied to 19th-century Queens Marie-Amelie and Hortense, and Empress Eugenie’s pearl-and-diamond tiara.

The robbery has focused attention on security at the Louvre, the world’s most-visited museum.

The thieves took less than eight minutes to force their way into the museum and leave, using a freight lift to reach the building’s window. Footage from museum cameras showed two broke into the ornate Apollo Gallery, cutting into the jewellery display cases with disc cutters and making off with the trove, while two riders on scooters whisked them away.

The emerald-set imperial crown of Napoleon III’s wife, Empress Eugenie, containing more than 1,300 diamonds, was later found outside the museum.

Five more people have been arrested in the investigation into the theft of crown jewels from the Louvre Museum, but the treasures remain missing, the Paris prosecutor announced Thursday (October 30, 2025).

The five were detained on late Wednesday night (October 29, 2025) in separate police operations in Paris and surrounding areas, including the Seine-Saint-Denis region, prosecutor Laure Beccuau told RTL radio. She did not release their identities or other details.

One is suspected of being part of the four-person team that robbed the Louvre’s Apollo Gallery in broad daylight on October 19, the prosecutor said. Two other members of the team were arrested on Sunday (October 26, 2025) and given preliminary charges on Wednesday (October 29, 2025) of criminal conspiracy and theft committed by an organised gang. Both partially admitted their involvement, according to the prosecutor.

“Searches last night and overnight did not allow us to find the goods,” Ms. Beccuau said.

It took thieves less than eight minutes to steal the jewels valued at 88 million euros ($102 million), shocking the world. The robbers forced open a window, cut into cases with power tools, and fled with eight pieces of the French crown jewels.

One of those who has been charged is a 34-year-old Algerian national who has been living in France since 2010, Ms. Beccuau said. He was arrested at Charles de Gaulle Airport as he was about to fly to Algeria with no return ticket. He was living in a suburb north of Paris, Aubervilliers, and was known to police mostly for road traffic offenses. His DNA was found on one of the scooters used by robbers to leave the scene, she said.

The other suspect, 39, was arrested at his home in Aubervilliers. The man was known to police for several thefts, and his DNA was found on one of the glass cases where the jewels were displayed and on items the thieves left behind, she added.

Video surveillance cameras showed there were at least four criminals involved, Ms. Beccuau said.

The four suspected robbers arrived onboard a truck equipped with a freight lift that two of them used to climb up to the museum’s window. The four of them left onboard two motor scooters along the Seine River toward eastern Paris, where they had some other vehicles parked, she detailed.

Ms. Beccuau said nothing suggests that the robbers had any accomplices within the museum’s staff.

She made a plea Wednesday night to those who have the jewels: “These jewels are now, of course, unsellable… Anyone who buys them would be guilty of concealment of stolen goods. There’s still time to give them back.”

French police have acknowledged major gaps in the Louvre’s defenses—turning the dazzling daylight theft into a national reckoning over how France protects its treasures.

Two suspects in the brazen daylight heist of some of France’s crown jewels from the Louvre were arrested in Paris on Saturday (October 25, 2025) evening and are being questioned, Le Parisien newspaper reported on Sunday (October 26, 2025), citing sources close to the investigation.

One of the two suspects was about to leave the country and was taken into custody at Charles de Gaulle airport at about 10 p.m. on Saturday (October 25, 2025), the paper said. The other was arrested later in the evening in the Seine-Saint-Denis suburb north of Paris.

Paris police were not immediately available for comment.

Thieves stole eight precious pieces worth an estimated $102 million from the Louvre’s collection on October 19, exposing security lapses as they broke into the world’s most-visited museum using a crane to smash an upstairs window during opening hours. They escaped on motorbikes.

News of the robbery reverberated around the world, prompting soul-searching in France over what some regarded as a national humiliation.

According to Le Parisien, the two men are in their thirties and originally from the Seine-Saint-Denis area. They were known to French police, and one of the suspects was about to depart for Algeria, the newspaper said.

It was shortly after the stunning heist of the crown jewels at the Louvre when Paris-based Associated Press photographer Thibault Camus caught in his frame a dapperly dressed young man walking by uniformed French police officers, their car blocking one of the museum gates.

Instinctively, he took the shot.

It wasn’t a particularly great photo, with someone’s shoulder obscuring part of the foreground, Mr. Camus told himself.

But it did the job — showing French police sealing off the world’s most-visited museum after the brazen daylight robbery last Sunday (October 19, 2025).

Plus, Mr. Camus figured, the guy walking past the officers was unusually well dressed, in a coat, a jacket and tie and wearing a fedora, adding a touch of Paris couture to the scene.

And so off went the photo to AP’s worldwide audiences.

From there, fertile imaginations sprung into high gear — whipping up an online buzz.

Posts on social media declared the well-dressed man to be a French detective — if you will, a more dashing version of the famed Inspector Clouseau from “Pink Panther” movies — even though AP’s photo caption had not identified him.

It simply read, “Police officers block an access to the Louvre museum after a robbery Sunday, Oct. 19, 2025, in Paris.”

A post on X that now has 5.6 million views says: “Actual shot (not AI!) of a French detective working the case of the French Crown Jewels that were stolen from the Louvre.”

Another poster — with 1.2 million followers — claimed the man “who looks like he came out of a detective film noir from the 1940s is an actual French police detective who’s investigating the theft.”

Mr. Camus says nothing he saw led him to that conclusion — the man was just someone who streamed away from the Louvre as authorities evacuated the area, Mr. Camusaa says. “He appeared in front of me, I saw him, I took the photo,” Mr. Camusaa says. “He passed by and left.”

If the unidentified man really is one of the more than 100 investigators hunting for the jewel thieves, the authorities are keeping it very hush-hush.

“We’d rather keep the mystery alive ;)” the Paris prosecutor’s office said with a wink in an email response to AP questions.