Six Arrested Following €12M Heist on Gold Processing Laboratory in France

A group of six individuals equipped with high-powered firearms employed explosives to break into a gold treatment facility located in Lyon, France, causing light wounds to five workers during described as the most recent prominent daytime heist to hit the nation.

The daring raid took place on Thursday late morning, with police forces quickly arresting the alleged criminals and retrieving the loot valued at approximately 12 million euros (£10.5 million), officials reported.

Five workers of Laboratoires Pourquery were slightly hurt due to the explosion, and three of them were transported to hospital for examination, the regional prefecture announced. A total of twenty-eight staff were inside the facility when the perpetrators raided.

The suspects, thought to be seasoned offenders, were arrested soon afterwards in the nearby town of Vénissieux, authorities revealed.

A female participant involved in the raid was likewise arrested, according to law enforcement.

“Six people who employed explosive devices in an attack on a gold refining facility in Lyon, France were apprehended red-handed,” the nation's interior minister announced via X, praising officers for their “decisiveness, speed and control”.

High-caliber firearms, handguns and detonation devices were recovered as well.

The heist took place as law enforcement in France on Thursday arrested five more suspects, including a primary suspect, in connection with the recent audacious raid on the Louvre museum.

Dozens of investigators have been pursuing four robbers who used a vehicle featuring an elevating platform and cutting equipment to break into an upper-level exhibition space at the renowned museum on the nineteenth of October, escaping with jewelry valued at approximately 88 million euros.

In a separate high-profile case, burglars recently forced their way into the French capital's Natural History Museum, stealing gold samples estimated at exceeding $1M. A 24-year-old Chinese woman was taken into custody recently in Barcelona in relation to the burglary, officials confirmed.

The sequence of heists has generated apprehension in France regarding lax security at museums and other institutions containing precious artifacts.