Sunday 19 October 2025, Paris. It’s nine thirty in the morning when four hooded men appear in front of the Louvre with a moving goods lift. They wear yellow vests and blend in with the workers on the nearby construction site. In seven minutes they enter the Apollo Gallery, cut the windows with grinders and escape on two scooters. Loot: eight jewels belonging to Napoleon and the French royal family, estimated at 88 million euros. Among these are Maria Amelia’s necklace with 631 diamonds and eight sapphires, and Empress Eugenie’s diadem with almost two thousand diamonds.
A spectacular heist – in broad daylight, in the most visited museum in the world – which brings back memories of the thefts that made history. Because if today thieves escape with precious stones, a century ago an Italian painter stole none other than the Mona Lisa. And he hid it under his coat.
The Italian who stole the Mona Lisa
It was August 21, 1911 when Vincenzo Peruggia, a 30-year-old decorator from Varese, decided to lock himself inside the Louvre museum. He knows those corridors well: he worked here to install protections on the paintings. At seven in the morning, when the museum is still closed to the public, he removes the Mona Lisa from the wall. He removes the frame, wraps the panel in his jacket and leaves undisturbed. He gets on the wrong bus, gets off, gets a lift from a car. At home he hides Leonardo’s painting in a wooden chest built by himself.
For two years there was no trace of the painting. The police interrogate everyone, even Pablo Picasso. Nobody suspects the modest Italian worker. In December 1913, Peruggia contacted a Florentine antiques dealer: he wanted to return the Mona Lisa to Italy, convinced that Napoleon had stolen it. He was wrong: Leonardo himself sold it to the King of France Francis I in 1517. But Peruggia believed he was making a patriotic gesture.
The antiques dealer calls the police. The Italian is arrested in a hotel in Florence. At the trial, the Tuscan students give him 4500 lire as thanks. He was sentenced to seven months, already served while awaiting trial. The Mona Lisa returned to the Louvre in January 1914, welcomed by the President of the Republic and the entire government. The outcry of the theft transformed it into a legend: first it was a masterpiece among many, then it would become the most famous painting in the world.
The Antwerp Diamond Tunnel
Antwerp, Belgium. 80% of the world’s precious stones pass through its diamond district. The World Diamond Center is considered impenetrable: thermal sensors, Doppler radar, three-ton steel door, combination of a hundred million possibilities. Leonardo Notarbartolo, a thief from Palermo who moved to Turin, studied the vault for over two years. Rent an office in the building, become a familiar face. Film everything with a camera hidden in a pen. In a warehouse he builds an exact replica of the vault for testing.
On the night of February 15, 2003, he and three accomplices from the “Turin School” went into action. They use hairspray to cover the sensors, shield the infrared, and recover the 30 centimeter long key hanging in the guard room (just as Notarbartolo had filmed). In the dark, to avoid cameras, they open 123 safes out of 160. It takes them three minutes per box with a modified drill. Away with diamonds and precious stones worth over 100 million dollars.
But a trivial mistake betrays them: during the escape one of them throws away a bag in the woods. Inside there is a half-eaten salami, gloves, tools. And an invoice with the name Notarbartolo. The police arrested him five days later. He is sentenced to ten years. Diamonds? They have never been found. The “Italian Lupine” today lives free in Giaveno, in the province of Turin. Netflix dedicated a documentary to him.
Boston, the robbery never solved
March 18, 1990, Boston. Two men disguised as policemen ring the doorbell of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum: they say they are answering a call. The guards let them in. Fatal error. The fake agents immobilize them in the basement with duct tape. Then for 81 minutes they empty the rooms.
They cut the canvases from the frames: three Rembrandts (including “The Storm on the Sea of Galilee”, the only seascape by the Dutch master), a Vermeer (“The Concert”, one of only 36 existing paintings by the artist), five Degas, a Manet. Estimated value: 500 million dollars. The largest art theft in history. The works? Never seen again. At the museum the empty frames remain hanging on the walls, empty testimonies of an unbridgeable loss.
In 2013, the FBI claims to know the identity of the thieves, but does not reveal their names. It’s about a criminal organization between New England and the Mid-Atlantic. The main suspects are dead. Connecticut mobster Robert Gentile denies any involvement until his death in 2021. The museum is still offering a $10 million reward, and after 35 years, the mystery endures.
The tunnel under Fortaleza
August 2005, Fortaleza, Brazil. For three months around forty people dig a tunnel under the busy Avenida Dom Manuel. The target is the vault of the Central Bank of Brazil. The tunnel is 80 meters long, four meters deep and just 70 centimeters wide. It costs half a million reais to make.
Thieves know everything: when the cameras don’t work, where the sensors don’t reach, which banknotes aren’t registered. A former bank security officer is among the accomplices. On the weekend of August 6th they enter the vault. They fill six water tanks of one thousand liters each with 164 million reais in used, untraceable 50 banknotes, the loot is considerable: over 70 million dollars, almost four tons of cash.
The theft was discovered only on Monday morning. The thieves have 44 hours to spare, but they make a fatal mistake: they buy ten cars in one go, paying in cash with the stolen money. The police stop them, find six million reais hidden in the cars. A calling card left in the tunnel leads to the others. Dozens of suspects are arrested, yet only a small portion of the money – around 20 million reais – is recovered. The rest? Vanished into thin air, probably hidden or already spent. Some thieves will be kidnapped for extortion (like Luis Fernando Ribeiro, considered the mastermind of the operation, who was killed after paying a ransom), others killed, and the perfect heist will turn into a curse.
The mysterious fate of the Rimet Cup
20 March 1966, London. The English World Cup was just a few months away when the Rimet Cup, the World Cup trophy, disappeared from Westminster Central Hall. Scotland Yard mobilizes everyone. They arrest an unemployed man who demands a ransom, but the cup cannot be found. Seven days later a little dog called Pickles found her under a hedge, wrapped in newspaper. The owner receives a reward, Pickles becomes a national hero.
A small question immediately arises: is that really the original cup? Many suspect that the English, embarrassed, had a copy made. And that Bobby Moore, in July 1966, raised precisely that reply to the sky after the victory in the final against Germany. The doubt remains. Pelé will lift the Jules Rimet Cup in 1970 in Mexico against Valcareggi’s Italy, Brazil will win the third World Cup and the cup will become his forever, as per FIFA rule (whoever had won the cup three times would have kept it permanently. In 1970, after the successes of ’58 and ’62, Brazil would close the circle).
December 19, 1983, Rio de Janeiro. Three thieves enter the headquarters of the Brazilian Federation, immobilize the guard and steal the cup. The police find them within days, unlike the cup, which was melted down and turned into gold bars. The thieves made just $15,500 from it. Then one of them is killed by an accomplice due to a wrong division. And the doubt returns: was that cast the original or another copy? Mystery surrounds football’s most coveted trophy. FIFA is today exhibiting at the National Football Museum in Preston a replica bought at auction in 1997 for over 250,000 pounds, disputed with the Brazilian federation.
