Name: Italian heist sees thieves steal paintings worth millions | BBC News
Uploaded: 2026-03-31T13:09:19.000Z
Duration: 3 min 37 s
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Now, who could forget the daylight robbery in October last year of the heavily guarded Louvre Museum in Paris?

A gang of thieves, with the help of a mechanical ladder, breaking into the first-floor Apollo Gallery to steal crown jewels from the royal collection.

The museum's director has since resigned.

And in the museum world, the concern that others might be inspired to commit similar copycat crimes.

And here we are, not so many months on, five pieces have just been stolen from the Magnani Rocca Foundation near Parma in Italy.

Four mask men took paintings by Renoir, Cézanne, and Matisse, worth millions of euros.

They were in and out in just three minutes.

It was only the interruption of the museum's alarm system that prevented them from stealing more.

Chris Marinello is an art lawyer, founder of Art Recovery International.

It's an organization that specializes in locating and recovering stolen works of art.

So let's start with what has been stolen.

How significant are the pieces that have been taken?

A Matisse, Renoir, and a Cézanne, you know, we're getting reports of well over 9 million euros.

But they were a part and parcel of the collection and a very important part of this museum's, uh, he-heritage and, and

They were in and out extremely quickly, three minutes.

I-is there something about this museum that made it an attractive target?

And, uh, you know, like many of the country houses in the UK, they are not as well protected, uh, as a in-town museum may be.

But to the credit of the security officers and the police, they were there within four minutes, uh, essentially in the middle of nowhere.

I-I-I set it up as an echo of what happened last year at the Louvre.

Is there any suggestion that the techniques were similar or that this might have been a copycat crime?

Well, the message that was sent to the world at the Louvre was that criminals, if they can get in anywhere, they can get into the Louvre, they can get anywhere.

This is a rural museum, uh, outside of Parma.

I thought that the museum world was going to wake up and start addressing their security concerns in a little more serious manner.

I-i-is there a market for stolen art, and who would the likely buyer be?

Well, the criminals don't really plan B yet.

They th-they don't know what they're gonna do once they sell these things.

And the more press that these stories get, the more difficult it is to monetize the theft.

And they're gonna find that out very soon.

Uh, they will try to move them on through Belgium or perhaps Eastern Europe to, uh, Middle East or Russia, countries where due diligence is not often practiced as, as it is in the West.

And what are so they're gonna find a hard time selling these pieces.

Well, I was gonna say, what about tracing and recovering stolen art, which is the business you're in?

Well, we s we find a very small percentage, maybe 5 to 10 percent of all art that's stolen is ever recovered, which is why we need to start focusing more on prevention.

Because a-as you can see now, anybody with a, a, a sledgehammer and a buckle of, uh, uh, uh, a ski mask can, uh, break into a museum,