PARIS, France: French police arrested 16 people in raids Monday over the armed robbery of US reality TV star Kim Kardashian in Paris last year based on DNA found at the crime scene, police sources said.
Police swooped in the Paris region and the south of France following forensic work at the luxury Paris residence where Kardashian was tied up and robbed of jewelry worth around nine million euros ($9.5 million) in October, one of the sources told AFP.
“One of the DNA samples matched an individual known to police for robbery and criminal offenses, who is considered a major thug,” the source said.
Using the evidence found at the scene, investigators were able to put in place a surveillance operation and build up a picture of the criminal network behind the robbery, he said, adding that it stretched to Belgium.
Money and documents were also seized in Monday’s raids.
A gang of armed and masked men wearing police uniforms had burst into the residence in the chic Madeleine area of the capital where 36-year-old Kardashian and her entourage were staying during Paris Fashion Week.
The gang tied up Kardashian, locked her in the bathroom and fled with jewelry including a ring worth around four million euros and a case of jewelry with a value of five million euros.
The Kardashian family’s French bodyguard Pascal Duvier was not at the scene at the time because he was providing security for Kim’s sister Kourtney at a Paris nightclub.
Kardashian, who is married to rap mogul Kanye West, finally broke her silence about the incident this weekend, saying she feared she was going to be killed by the robbers.
“They’re going to shoot me in the back,” she sobbed to her sisters while recounting the ordeal in a promotional clip for the new season of her TV show “Keeping Up with the Kardashians.”
“There’s no way out. It makes me so upset to think about it,” she added.
It is believed the men escaped on bicycles but one of the gang dropped a diamond pendant worth around 30,000 euros in the street outside.
It was found by a passer-by and handed in to police several hours after the robbery.
Kardashian lodged a formal complaint in France after she was filmed fiddling with her mobile phone at the residence immediately after the robbery.
Her lawyers said in October the video was made “without her consent or the police’s and while the police were investigating the crime scene.”
It emerged afterwards that Kardashian had raised the alarm after untying herself and calling her bodyguard.
Kardashian has harnessed the power of social media to rise to fame, with nearly 50 million followers on Twitter and 90 million on Instagram.
A month after the Kardashian robbery, two Qatari women were held up on a motorway outside Paris and robbed of valuables worth more than five million euros.
The women, in their sixties, had just left Le Bourget airport northeast of the capital when their chauffeur-driven Bentley was held up by two masked men who sprayed them with tear gas.
French police arrest 16 thugs over Kardashian robbery
French police arrest 16 thugs over Kardashian robbery
Cambodia takes back looted historic artifacts handled by British art dealer
- The objects were returned under a 2020 agreement between the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts and the family of the late Douglas Latchford, a British art collector and dealer who allegedly had the items smuggled out of Cambodia
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia: Cambodian officials on Friday received more than six dozen historic artifacts described as part of the country’s cultural heritage that had been looted during decades of war and instability.
At a ceremony attended by Deputy Prime Minister Hun Many, the 74 items were unveiled at the National Museum in Phnom Penh after their repatriation from the United Kingdom.
The objects were returned under a 2020 agreement between the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts and the family of the late Douglas Latchford, a British art collector and dealer who allegedly had the items smuggled out of Cambodia.
“This substantial restitution represents one of the most important returns of Khmer cultural heritage in recent years, following major repatriations in 2021 and 2023 from the same collection,” the Culture Ministry said in a statement. “It marks a significant step forward in Cambodia’s continued efforts to recover, preserve, and restore its ancestral legacy for future generations.”
The artifacts were described as dating from the pre-Angkorian period through the height of the Angkor Empire, including “monumental sandstone sculptures, refined bronze works, and significant ritual objects.” The Angkor Empire, which extended from the ninth to the 15th century, is best known for the Angkor Wat archaeological site, the nation’s biggest tourist attraction.
Latchford was a prominent antiquities dealer who allegedly orchestrated an operation to sell looted Cambodian sculptures on the international market.
From 1970 to the 1980s, during Cambodia’s civil wars and the communist Khmer Rouge ‘s brutal reign, organized looting networks sent artifacts to Latchford, who then sold them to Western collectors, dealers, and institutions. These pieces were often physically damaged, having been pried off temple walls or other structures by the looters.
Latchford was indicted in a New York federal court in 2019 on charges including wire fraud and conspiracy. He died in 2020, aged 88, before he could be extradited to face charges.
Cambodia, like neighboring Thailand, has benefited from a trend in recent decades involving the repatriation of art and archaeological treasures. These include ancient Asian artworks as well as pieces lost or stolen during turmoil in places such as Syria, Iraq and Nazi-occupied Europe. New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art is one of the prominent institutions that has been returning illegally smuggled art, including to Cambodia.
“The ancient artifacts created and preserved by our ancestors are now being returned to Cambodia, bringing warmth and joy, following the country’s return to peace,” said Hun Many, who is the younger brother of Prime Minister Hun Manet.
