Watch thefts are definitely endless in Paris. On the night of Sunday to Monday on the occasion of a commercial operation of the Swatch brand, which took place on the forecourt of the Trocadero (XVIth), three people were attacked by criminals who resented their famous plastic tocantes.
From 20 p.m. to midnight, the Swiss brand deploys a barnum on the Trocadero esplanade, opposite the Café de l'Homme. "It was a flash sale of limited series watches," says a source close to the case. In the early evening, the operation goes well. The queue is set up on the vast belvedere, where it is supervised by twenty-five security guards. But at 22 p.m., a security guard alerted the police, explaining that he had rescued a buyer. A patrol arrives on the scene and this young man tells the officials that he has just been attacked by four or five thieves at the level of the Avenue de La Bourdonnais (VIIth). The thugs took his brand new "Swatch Omega" watch, his sneakers and 1,000 euros in cash. The quintet rushed into a car before fleeing.
Crowd movement and watch theft
A quarter of an hour later, rue de l'Université, two new victims call the police. They say they have just been attacked by a gang that snatched their two new "Swatch" watches from them. The three victims, not injured, will file a complaint on Monday. During the night, the number of security forces was reinforced to secure the area and prevent any further attacks.
This story is at the crossroads of two phenomena. Business operations that always generate crowd movements attracted by the opportunity to make a good deal. And watch theft is a real scourge in the capital. Last noteworthy, on Friday, May 26, a Ukrainian tourist was robbed of his Richard Mille worth 300,000 euros in the eighth arrondissement of Paris. Bands also circulate in the capital in search of gold Rolex and use the dangerous technique of rear choke to achieve their ends.
