German police recover 31 items stolen in 2019 Dresden museum heist

Dec. 17 (UPI) -- German police said Saturday they have recovered 31 objects stolen from the famed Green Vault at the Dresden Castle Museum in a daring heist staged three years ago.

The dozens of items, representing a "significant part" of the stolen loot, were recovered in Berlin via negotiations with lawyers representing six suspects accused of stealing them in 2019, Saxony Police said in statement.

The stolen objects, which include diamond-encrusted items, are estimated to be worth $120 million. They were part of a collection created in 1793 by Augustus the Strong, the ruler of Saxony.

"The valuable works of art from the Green Vault are part of our country's cultural heritage," Saxony Prime Minister Michael Kretschmer said in a Twitter post. "Only through the determined and professional work of the police and public prosecutors could the perpetrators be identified, arrested and the crime solved."

The 2019 heist involved several masked men breaking into the museum after disabling a circuit breaker. The robbers then smashed a display case and recovered the jewels with fishing wire before fleeing the scene in an Audi, which was later discovered on fire in an underground parking garage.

German authorities formed a special commission to investigate the heist. Dresden police announced the arrests of three of the suspects in 2020.

Some of the items, including the revered Dresden White Diamond, are still missing. The recovered items will be examined by experts from the Dresden State Art Collections to confirm that they are authentic.

Six men accused of involvement in the heist went on trial in Dresden in January.