Six Suspects Apprehended After €12M Armed Raid on Precious Metals Facility in the French Republic

A team of six suspects carrying assault rifles and handguns employed explosives to break into a gold refining laboratory located in the city of Lyon, slightly injuring five workers during what is being called the most recent prominent broad daylight robbery to affect the country.

The daring raid occurred on Thursday afternoon, with officers quickly arresting the alleged criminals and recovering the stolen goods estimated to be worth €12M (10.5 million pounds), officials reported.

Five employees of Laboratoires Pourquery received light wounds due to the explosion, and three of them required hospital checks for evaluation, according to regional authorities. A total of twenty-eight staff were at the location when the perpetrators raided.

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

A female participant involved in the robbery was taken into custody as well, according to law enforcement.

“Six individuals who utilized explosives in an assault targeting a metals processing plant in Lyon were apprehended red-handed,” the French interior minister announced via X, praising officers for their “quick action, authority and management”.

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

The raid happened as French police on Thursday apprehended five additional individuals, among them a key figure, in relation to the recent audacious Louvre museum robbery.

Many investigative personnel have been pursuing four thieves who used a vehicle featuring an elevating platform and cutting tools to break into an upper-level exhibition space at the renowned museum on the nineteenth of October, escaping with precious items estimated to be worth 88 million euros.

In a separate high-profile case, burglars recently forced their way into the Parisian museum of natural history, taking gold specimens worth over $1 million. A woman from China, aged 24 was apprehended in the current month in the city of Barcelona in relation to the burglary, prosecutors stated.

The sequence of heists has sparked worry in France regarding lax security at museums and various establishments containing precious artifacts.