Europol, in collaboration with other police forces, arrested four suspected thieves of old and rare books in Georgia and Latvia on Wednesday. The gang is said to have stolen at least 170 books from various libraries in Europe, particularly in Switzerland.
Europol estimates the value of the stolen goods at around 2.5 million euros (around 2.4 million francs), the European police agency said on Thursday. Some of the stolen artifacts were reportedly sold at auctions in St. Petersburg and Moscow. They are now virtually impossible to recover.
During the arrests carried out on Wednesday, 150 books were seized. Europol and its partners had previously arrested five suspects in different countries. In total, nine people were arrested. The Federal Police Office (fedpol) participated in the investigations.
Originals versus copies
The criminal gang stole books between 2022 and 2023 from libraries in the Czech Republic, Estonia, France, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Switzerland. The thieves went after rare and generally Russian books. The first editions of the authors Alexander Pushkin and Nicolas Gogol were, for example, stolen.
In some cases, the thugs presented themselves in libraries as academics to access the books. First, they photographed and measured the works in order to make copies. During a second visit, they then replaced the originals with copies, deemed ‘of excellent quality’ by the specialists.
In other cases, the scammers simply broke into libraries and helped themselves, visiting buildings beforehand to prepare. Due to the repetitive modus operandi of the flights, Europol was able to link the different cases and convene a transnational investigation network.
/ATS
