A Ritzy Paris Building Where Millionaires Will Live Next to Former Homeless People

Wallets, please. Merci. Police here have arrested three chronic train robbers but are still looking for their victims, who are thought to number around 170. The accused men, from Marseille and Nice, relieved more than 100 first-class rail passengers of their luggage, cash, and jewelry on the Paris-Nice, Paris-Marseille, and Lyon-Geneva lines. They were “skilled and quick,” a local police chief told The Guardian, which described how one would “disguise himself in a variety of wigs and women’s clothing and take a seat next to unsuspecting passengers. Subtly, that thief and two accomplices would take wallets, luggage left at people’s feet or bags left unattended, without raising suspicions. They then got off at the next station.”

When CCTV footage caught the theft of a bag containing nearly $50,000 worth of jewelry from a passenger departing Aix-en-Provence, police launched an investigation that eventually led to a Marseille apartment, where they discovered a stash “including 150 pieces of luggage, 170 wallets, hundreds of pairs of sunglasses, fountain pens, camera equipment, gadgets and expensive shoes.” Also $137,000 “in small denominations of cash.” One victim was tracked down in San Francisco; in 2019 he’d been on his way to the Cannes Film Festival when his belongings disappeared, among them a $70,000 watch.