A brazen robbery at the Louvre Museum in Paris Sunday morning has left investigators searching for four men who made off with what officials describe as "priceless" jewels.
The Paris Prosecutor's office told NPR that two of the suspects broke into the museum's Galerie d'Apollon, which houses some of the museum's most valuable treasures, through a second-floor window shortly after the museum opened. Armed with small chainsaws and box cutters, the men smashed display cases before fleeing on Yamaha TMax scooters toward a nearby highway.
Two pieces of stolen jewelry — including the crown of Empress Eugénie, the wife of Napoleon III — were later found near the museum, apparently dropped or abandoned as the suspects fled. The gold and diamond encrusted crown was damaged, the prosecutor's office said.
A Louvre spokesperson described the items as being of "inestimable cultural and historical value."
French Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez called the theft "a major, highly organized operation" that lasted just seven minutes. "There's a judicial investigation underway," Nuñez told France Inter radio, adding the missing items were "of true heritage value — truly priceless."