Thieves use catacombs in Paris to steal wines

Thieves have removed 300 bottles of fine wines worth $375,000 from a cellar in central Paris after breaking into the trove of vintages from the catacombs, a maze of mainly off-limits tunnels under the capital.

The apparently well-informed thieves first broke into the catacombs from one of many secret or sealed entrances around Paris and drilled a hole through the cellar wall of the property near the Luxembourg gardens, which houses the French Senate.

After stealing the wine, they quietly vanished back underground, police said.

“One can assume that they had made reconnaissance missions and that the criminals didn’t drill through this wall by chance,” one police source told France Soir.

A spokeswoman for the Paris prosecutor said: “The owners just discovered the theft but it could have taken place any time between late July and late August.”

“We’re talking about very, very good wine worth between €500 and €1,000 per bottle,” she said. “It appears they made their getaway back down the catacombs. The judicial police of the 3rd district have launched an investigation, searching both the cellar and the tunnels below,” she said.

The cellar was under a block of flats in Rue d’Assas, which runs right next to the Luxembourg gardens.