00:00Until last November, he was the man in charge of the silverware at the Elysee Palace.
00:05Now, Thomas M. is in court, charged with stealing porcelain plates, coffee cups, and champagne flutes used for presidential dinners.
00:14In total, about 150 items were stolen, including blue and gold plates decorated with birds, which date back to 1872,
00:23worth thousands of euros.
00:24We see an example of a plate with the same design, delivered to the Elysee Palace in 1861, which sold
00:31in Vienna for 1,300 euros.
00:33It's shocking because it's part of our shared heritage, just as we were all shocked after the fest of the
00:39jewels from the Louvre.
00:40It's absurd because these objects are unsellable.
00:45Unsellable outside of official channels because they're numbered and stamped with the Elysee's monogram,
00:50except for the oldest pieces, which the head steward removed while taking care to falsify the inventory.
00:56He and his partner resold them to collector groups on Facebook, notably to a man in his 30s,
01:02a porcelain enthusiast on the outskirts of Paris.
01:05Giselin M., who's also on trial, admitted to receiving stolen goods, but explained himself in this exchange with France 2.
01:24In an ironic twist, the young man was a guard at the Louvre, well before the museum's spectacular heist.
01:30He had even posted several photos of himself on Facebook in the Apollo Gallery, where the heist took place.
01:36The court has banned him from working there again.
01:39If convicted, the three men face up to seven years in prison and a fine of up to 375,000
01:46euros.
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