A former employee of the luxury shoe brand Christian Louboutin was arrested on November 5 in Paris, suspected of having stolen around 1,400 pieces of leather goods and pairs of shoes worth nearly 1.5 million euros in goods, Franceinfo learned on Wednesday November 13 from a source close to the matter. This source specifies that this 30-year-old woman has been indicted and placed under judicial supervision. Contacted by franceinfo, the Paris public prosecutor's office has so far not responded to our requests.
The story begins in September 2023, when a Louboutin employee discovered two Facebook pages specializing in the sale of products from the new “Marvel” collection. What catches his attention is that these photos are posted before the official launch of the collection by the luxury brand, a report is immediately sent to Louboutin's legal director. The company realizes that the models sold on these pages have in fact been stolen.
To find out more about this theft, Louboutin then hires a private detective who traces it back to a man located in the United States. This man, considered a dealer, confesses. He concluded an agreement with the American justice system which, in exchange for dropping the charges, gave the name of his supplier. This is how the name of the ex-Louboutin employee comes up.
Until July 2023, she was the coordinator of the Parisian Louboutin showroom located on rue du Louvre. It is in this showroom where the new collections are presented that this woman is suspected of having stolen 700 pairs of shoes and 700 models of leather goods. From August 2023 she was hired at Dior where she became logistics coordinator, her job being to manage the flow of prototypes for the luxury brand. Here again, she is suspected of having implemented the same process to steal products from the brand to resell them.
This woman, of French nationality, was finally arrested on November 5 at her home in Paris in the 16th arrondissement. During the search carried out by police officers from the 1st judicial police district of Paris (1st DPJ), investigators came across 192 luxury pieces from Dior and Louboutin with an estimated market value of 145,000 euros. Four mobile phones belonging to her were also seized – she refused to give the access codes – two cars including a Mercedes class A placed under judicial seal. In this car, the police discovered two bags and two pairs of Louboutin shoes.
The investigators also traced the financial flows of this woman. They noticed that numerous sums of money – more than 400,000 euros – were passing through several accounts belonging to him, sums which far exceeded his income. During her police custody, this woman denied the thefts and all the facts with which she is accused, blaming her colleagues: she assured the police that many Louboutin employees stole the brand's products as they wanted. in its Parisian showroom, the stocks being, according to it, left unattended. Confronted with the products discovered at home, this woman assures that she bought them via private sales organized by Dior and Louboutin.
