Five German gang members sentenced for Green Vault jewel heist

The thieves looted goods worth more than 113 million euros ($123 million) from the Green Vault in Dresden in 2019.

A German court has sentenced five gang members to six years in prison for stealing priceless 18th-century jewels from a Dresden museum in what has been called the largest art heist in modern history.

The convicted men, who appeared relieved by relatively light sentences on Tuesday, are members of the “Remmo clan”, an extended family living mainly in Berlin and known for its ties to organized crime.

The pieces stolen in the 2019 Gruenes Gewoelbe Museum (Green Vault) burglary in Dresden include more than 4,300 diamonds with an estimated value of more than 113 million euros ($123 million).

They include a breast star of the Polish Order of the White Eagle and an ornate diamond headdress. However, police have said most of the stolen jewels have been recovered.

Six German men, all in their twenties, had been charged with aggravated gang theft and serious arson.

Five members of the same family received sentences of four years and four months and six years and two months. A sixth family member was acquitted.

However, the plea deal drew criticism, with the chairman of the Berlin State Prosecutor’s Office, Ralph Knispel, noting that the defendants were under no obligation to disclose their accomplices.

“The question is what message it sends” to other criminals, Knispel told public broadcaster RBB.

Prosecutors said the men sawed through and reattached part of a window grille beforehand in order to get into the building as quickly as possible during the robbery.

The stolen Dresden collection was brought together in the 18th century by Augustus the Strong, Elector of Saxony and later King of Poland, who ordered more and more brilliant jewelery as part of his rivalry with the French King Louis XIV.

The treasures survived Allied bombings in World War II, but were disposed of as war booty by the Soviet Union. In 1958 they were returned to Dresden, the historic capital of Saxony.