Le Pen targets Louvre thieves

GANGS of roaming thieves and pickpockets are committing more than 40 thefts a day at the Louvre and Front National MP Marion Le Pen has demanded to know what is being done: apart from asking visitors to the country’s No1 tourist attraction to “take care”.

Le Pen, the granddaughter of former FN president Jean-Marie Le Pen, said exasperated and frightened museum guards had gone on a one-day strike – closing the Paris museum – to highlight the problem.

In a written question to Interior Minister Manuel Valls she said gangs of pickpockets, many young children, had invaded public places such as the base of the Eiffel Tower, the Champs de Mars, Notre-Dame, Versailles and the grands magasins robbing tourists “with impunity”.

She asked what was being done to stop thefts “which were painting a disastrous picture of France” for the many victims.

Security and reception staff at the museum said they were inundated with complaints of thefts and attempted thefts in the galleries and they spent as much time taking theft details as they did giving information on the museum.

Other staff said they were scared of the gangs of thieves who knew their names, their rounds, their routines. The youngsters would smoke and eat in the galleries and, when caught, would launch a volley of abuse and spittle while attacking, punching and scratching agents.

Once the thieves were put out of the museum they would return within 15 minutes and the guards’ union said there were between 30 and 50 pickpockets in the galleries each day.

They have demanded more police than the present 20 who are on duty outside the museum and in the entrance area. Police say the gangs are Romanians living in Seine-Sainte-Denis and they prey on Asian tourists.
Photo: Benh LIEU SONG Wikimedia Commons