Art heist suspect arrested

Dutch police arrested a 19-year-old woman alleged to have been part of a plot to steal a collection masterpieces from the Rotterdam Kunsthal last year. The young Romanian woman is the girlfriend of another person also suspected of involvement in the theft of seven paintings from the Kunsthal.

The paintings are worth between 100 and 200 million euros. Amongst them are works by Picasso, Monet, Matisse and Gauguin and others. The robbery was amongst the world's biggest art heists in the last 20 years. Police investigating acknowledged that there were no security guards on duty when the robbery happened. Thieves also took advantage of an automatic safety system by triggering a security alarm that put the museum in lockdown. The system was automatically deactivated within minutes. The gang then broke the lock on an emergency door, entered the museum, and quickly exited with the paintings. Police say they arrived approximately three minutes after the thieves fled the scene.