French police thwart €600,000 champagne heist
Police are hunting thieves who escaped after leading them on a ten-mile chase in two lorries loaded with €600,000 worth of champagne.
One driver leapt from his moving 38-tonne vehicle and boarded an escorting car after it was cornered on the Paris outer expressway ringroad. The other disappeared after dodging police and parking in a side street.
All the bottles of Moët & Chandon aboard the two vehicles were recovered.
Champagne theft is traditional in the run-up to Christmas. In late October last year, thieves with a lorry drove away an articulated trailer loaded with 10,000 bottles of G.H. Martel champagne worth €200,000. The lorry was recovered but neither its load nor the thieves were ever found.
Police believe that the champagne robbers depend on