While testifying on Wednesday about the robbery, Laurence des Cars, the president and director of the Louvre, told the Senate Culture Committee that the Eugenie crown was "crushed" when the robbers removed it through a crack they made in the protective glass case.

Museums are notoriously hard to protect. The Paris heist may have more in common with a "smash and grab" than a glamorous movie plot.

A new video has emerged showing what could be the Louvre thieves in action as they carried out Sunday’s daylight robbery at Paris’s world-famous museum. The footage, obtained by French broadcaster BFMTV, purportedly shows what has been called one of the most brazen art thefts in recent memory.

Authorities raced against the clock Tuesday as experts in art security told NBC News it could already be too late to recover the jewels.

The Louvre in Paris is open again, days after the spectacular robbery at the world-renowned museum, the latest in a series of robberies that has left visitors puzzling over empty cabinets and police in search of clues.

Brazen robbers stole priceless French crown jewels from the Louvre Museum's Apollo Gallery in broad daylight Saturday in what an expert calls a "targeted heist."