The scene lasted only a few minutes, leaving onlookers and sellers stunned. Sunday, December 10, around 10:45 a.m., two men with their faces hidden by motorcycle helmets burst into the very chic Kith boutique, in the heart of the 8th arrondissement of Paris. After spraying the security officers with tear gas, the robbers began to break the windows with hammers to steal luxury watches and jewelry. The damage from the theft was estimated at more than 600,000 euros, and the Paris prosecutor’s office indicated in the afternoon that it had opened an investigation, entrusted to the banditry suppression brigade. Impressive, this robbery is far from isolated: according to a study published last August by the British company The Watch Register, which lists all “stolen or missing” watches throughout the world, the number of stolen luxury watches increased by 60% globally in 2022. More than 80,000 timepieces are believed to have vanished into thin air, for damage estimated today at more than 1 billion euros. Rolexes remain the most sought after by burglars, and represent 44% of stolen watches. Next come models from the brands Omega (7%), Breitling (6%), Tag Heuer (6%), Cartier (4%) and Patek Philippe (3%).
For around ten years, France has not escaped this explosion of thefts: in the capital, a peak was even noted in 2021, with “nearly 300 seizures of luxury watches carried out by territorial security teams [ST] of Paris”, indicates to L’Express the head of the organization, Romain Semedard. To the point that, since 2014, a specific group composed of nine police officers, supported by two other groups from the ST of Paris, is responsible for “investigate specifically these thefts and the networks of fences deployed internationally. “We must understand that some have the price of an apartment around their wrist: some watches reach 300,000 euros”, recalls the divisional commissioner, who has become despite he specializes in luxury watch brands.
“The violence has gone up another notch”
Over the years, man has only been able to observe the development of thieves’ techniques, and their specialization on the subject. At the beginning of the 2010s, watch thefts were rather rare, a specialty of seasoned delinquents “who stole jewelry directly from customers, in the street or in the metro, by doing a false judo hold or a dance step, without until they realize it.” Often originating from Algeria, these golden-handed pickpockets then resold the watches directly via an international network, “passing through Algeria or Turkey before reaching the United Arab Emirates or the Gulf countries”. “Most of the time, the thieves recovered 90% of the amount of the stolen watch in a few hours,” adds Romain Semedard.
Because the second-hand watch market has greatly developed. “It is not so easy to obtain a Patek Philippe, Rolex or Audemars Piguet watch, for example. It is not enough to have money: you must be referenced, registered as a customer. The scarcity of products has makes the price of certain second-hand watches explode,” explains Marc Bitan, watch expert and director of the specialized boutique Les Champs d’or in Paris. Once sold, the watch can double or even triple in value depending on the models and collections. “Thieves can recover 20,000 euros in a few seconds from a watch, they understand the business well,” he adds.
According to Romain Semedard, the market ended up attracting criminal organizations, first and foremost the Camorra, the Neapolitan mafia. Their methods are more violent. “Often on two-wheelers, they spot tourists with luxurious watches, deliberately knock on their car or their rear-view mirror, then tear off the watch,” says the commissioner. After Covid, young thieves, “very mobile and often from the Parisian suburbs”, swelled their ranks. “The violence has gone up a notch: we are witnessing robberies with beatings, strangulations to the point of fainting, even kidnappings directly in clients’ apartments,” he explains.
Gérard Vautrin, watchmaking specialist and owner of the Olivine Prestige boutique, has received several testimonies from customers violently attacked for watch thefts. “One of them even ended up in a coma. Violent uprooting has become commonplace,” he assures.
“Even when stolen, watches have a rating”
Social networks have only worsened the phenomenon: on stories Instagram or TikTok, where owners post in real time with their luxury products, some burglars spot the most popular models, then go directly to their victims to steal them. One of the biggest cases that the agents of the “watch group” of the ST of Paris have had to deal with in 2023 concerns a Richard Mille watch worth around 200,000 euros, stolen from a tourist in the lobby of his building of the 20th arrondissement. “The attackers had spotted the product a few days earlier on his wrist, and organized the theft in advance,” explains Romain Semedard. “All watches, even stolen ones, have a rating. Thieves know them like the back of their hand, and are only interested in models that can bring in money,” explains Gérard Vautrin, giving the example of the Rolex Daytona Paul Newman, which can reach “300,000 euros new, and be resold in a few hours for more than 50,000 euros”.
If, in the 20th century case, the jewel could be found, Romain Semedard admits that this scenario is rather rare. “Most of the time, watches disappear within a few hours, and we never see them again,” explains the commissioner. The amount of loot is sometimes astronomical: the brigade recently worked on the theft of a Frédéric Jouvenot watch valued at 250,000 euros and stolen in the 19th arrondissement, or even on a Richard Mille estimated at more than 300,000 euros, stolen in the VIIIᵉ. Through neighborhood surveys, telephone surveillance and shadowing, the phenomenon seems to be fading slightly. After the 2021 peak observed in the capital, around 220 flights were handled by the Paris ST in 2022, and “a little less than a hundred” for the year 2023.
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