Homeless man who stole €500k found...but without cash

The man in his fifties was originally captured on CCTV on December 8 2017.

He accidentally stumbled into an office belonging to secure transit firm Loomis, discovered the bags of cash, and left with two sacks containing almost half a million euros.

The man’s location had been a mystery until now, as CCTV did not capture where he went after leaving the airport.

However, he had previously been known to authorities, and was thought to regularly visit the airport to pickpocket or find discarded food.

He was finally arrested this week after a “fortuitous” routine police identity check in a Seine-Saint-Denis house.

Speaking in police custody and court this week, he admitted the theft, but said that most of the money had been stolen in the days afterwards.

“Yes, I stole the money, there was loads of it,” he said.

He added that he had spent some of the cash himself, given some of it to friends, and hidden the rest.

This last amount was later stolen, the man said, after he was seriously assaulted by a gang that forced him to reveal the money’s hidden location.

Despite being questioned on the identity of the other alleged thieves, he has so far failed to name his attackers.

He is expected to be charged with theft, aggravated by two factors: firstly that the theft took place in an airport, and secondly that it was from a closed office intended for the safekeeping of funds.