Italian Police Recover Stolen Masterpieces Valued at Over $10 Million in Swift Operation

Carabinieri TPC art squad officers of the Parma Provincial Command have successfully recovered three valuable artworks that were stolen in March 2026 from the Fondazione Magnani Rocca Museum in Traversetolo, near Parma.

Speaking to the AFP news agency on Friday, Parma chief of police Andrea Pagliaro announced that nine Moldovans are currently under investigation in connection with the theft, with five suspected of executing the burglary.

The century-old masterpieces—created by Paul Cezanne, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, and Henri Matisse—were seized during a rapid operation that took less than three minutes at the museum near the northern city of Parma in late March.

Italy’s domestic police force, the Carabinieri, along with its cultural heritage protection unit, confirmed in a Friday statement that the paintings were tracked down and retrieved from an apartment in Parma, pointing toward the involvement of an organised gang.

Surveillance footage released by police on Friday reveals that the March 22 heist involved two masked burglars who entered the museum through a window, removed the paintings from the walls, and passed them to an accomplice waiting outside, even as an alarm was triggered.

In a separate development, authorities in Brazil reported late Thursday the recovery of separate artworks by Matisse. Valued at approximately $200,000, those pieces have been safely returned to the library from which they were stolen in December, following the discovery at a property in Sao Bernardo do Campo and the subsequent arrest of a man.