A Burnt-Out Car, a Bigger Gang, and No Insurance: New Details Emerge in the Frantic Hunt for Dresden’s Treasure Thieves

Dresden’s Green Vault remains a closed-off crime scene while the
rest of the Royal Palace museum reopened to the public on
Wednesday, November 27. Police continue to search for evidence as
they hunt for the thieves who robbed the Green Vault
of 11 pieces of Baroque
jewelry early on Monday.

With each passing day, fears are growing that the pieces may be
broken up. The heist seems to be the work of professionals, and
officials are concerned that the pieces will be dismantled, with
diamonds and other precious stones re-cut and then sold.

According to the director of Dresden’s State Art Collections,
Marion Ackermann, the stolen items are “priceless.” So priceless
that they were not insured. According Saxony’s finance minister,
the lack of insurance is standard practice because the premiums
tend to exceed the cost of repairing any potential
damages. The royal jewels taken include a sword with a
diamond-encrusted handle, diamond shoe buckles, buttons, and hair
clips, as well as a diamond necklace.

Police have established that is it likely the work of not just
the two thieves caught on security camera, but of four robbers. The
gang sprayed fire extinguishers to cover their tracks after
breaking into the iron gate of the Royal Palace museum where they
smashed a small window to gain access to the historic Green Vault,
and then axing the glass vitrines that held some of the museum’s
most precious and historic items.

A burned-out getaway car was found after the incident. The
police are assuming the vehicle (some reports say it was an Audi
A6) and another fire at an electrical box nearby to the museum are
connected to the robbery. The electrical box fire caused nearby
street lights and the museum to be plunged into darkness; it also
meant the alarm system was not activated. Security guards spotted
the thieves on security cameras and immediately notified the
police, who were on the scene within five minutes. So far, a
special commission set up for the investigation has received 205
tips from the public.

The Green Vault is one of the largest collections of Baroque
treasures in Europe. It was founded by Augustus the Strong, an
18th-century prince-elector of the German state of Saxony, who was
also the King of Poland.

The theft has sent ripples of insecurity through the
European and international museum community. The president of the
Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, Hermann Parzinger, told
German media on Tuesday that there is “an increased threat to
museums here.” Parzinger, who oversees 20 museums in the German
capital, has called on the nation’s police authorities and security
experts to set up a task force to address museum security in the
face of “the criminal energy” behind the heist.

Germany’s minister of culture Monika Grütters echoed Parzinger’s
call in an interview with Düsseldorf’s Rheinische
Post on Wednesday, November 27 to establish a task force to
deal with the vulnerability of Germany’s collections. Many other
incredibly valuable artifacts, art, and objects are housed in
Germany, she notes: “In our museums there are art treasures that
make up the cultural identity of our country and whose value is in
the billions,” she said.

Thieves were unable to steal Dresden’s Green Diamond, which is
on loan, along with other objects, to the Metropolitan Museum of
Art in New York. “We are devastated by the theft of the treasures
from the Grünes Gewölbe [Green Vault], which are held so
deeply in the hearts of the people of Dresden, and also so
important to the cultural history of the world,” said Met director
Max Hollein in a message of support to Dresden.

The post A Burnt-Out Car, a Bigger Gang, and No Insurance:
New Details Emerge in the Frantic Hunt for Dresden’s Treasure
Thieves appeared first on artnet News.