Six Georgians have been sentenced to up to seven years’ jail in France over the theft of rare editions of Russian literary classics, including by 19th-century luminary Alexander Pushkin, from prestigious French libraries.
The trial is the latest case seeking justice for a spate of similar heists in recent years from libraries across Europe, suspected to be the work of an organised network with potential links to Russia.
The thieves made away with rare Russian classics worth millions in total, including by 19th-century literary greats Pushkin, Nikolai Gogol and Mikhail Lermontov.
The six defendants — five men and a woman — were all found guilty overnight Friday to Saturday of criminal conspiracy with intent to commit an offence, while some were rapped for the theft of a cultural asset on display.
Two were sentenced in absentia, as they had already been arrested in their native Georgia, which does not extradite its citizens.
Another pair — identified only as Mikheil Z. and Beqa T. — have already been convicted and imprisoned in other countries for similar crimes and have been temporarily handed over to France.
Mikheil Z., 50, was handed the heaviest punishment of seven years in jail and a ban on ever setting foot on French soil once released and deported. He had already been sentenced last year in Lithuania to three years and four months in prison for the organised theft of 19th-century publications valued at €606,000 ($698,000).
Beqa T., 49, copped a four-year sentence, on top of the three years and six months in prison he had already been handed in Estonia.
In his submissions, the prosecutor stressed that the six defendants’ theft had been “massive, organised, planned and executed with meticulousness and cynicism”.
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