Laura's Insight

$28 Million Diamond Heist

Belgian police offered a $2.6 million reward Monday for information that will help located a man who stole $28 million in diamonds from an Antwerp bank last week. 

The ABN Amro bank discovered the theft on March 5, 2007.  It is believed that the stones were taken either Monday morning or the previous Friday from safety deposit boxes in the vault.  It is estimated that 120,000 carats were stolen.

It is clear that the man had been planning the robbery for sometime.  He had carefully gained the trust of bank employees for the past year and had become one of several trusted diamond traders who were given access to the vault by electronic card.   He went by the name Carlos Hector Flomenbaum from Argentina.  This is now believed by the authorities to have been a false identity because a passport in the same name was stolen from Israel a few years ago. 

A composite photo has been released, of a gray-haired man, 6 foot, 3 inches tall and aged between 55 and 60.  The man is said to speak English with an American accent and often wears a baseball cap.  The Belgian police are appealing to anyone who may have gotten to know the man during his time in the city to come forward.

The Lesotho Promise

The largest diamond found in the last 13 years known as the “Lesotho Promise” was sold at auction for $12 million and is expected to fetch in excess $20 million once it has been cut down.

The 603-carat diamond the tenth largest white diamond ever to have been found went under the hammer at the Antwerp Diamond Center and was sold to the South African Diamond Corporation, owner of the luxury jewelers Graff.

The diamond is expected to be cut into a large heart-shaped diamond and several smaller stones which will then be sold. The uncut size of the diamond is a third bigger than the size of a golf ball.

Tales of Expensive Rocks

In the June issue of “Vanity Fair plus Jewellery”, I read four fantastic stories of eccentric women and their extravagant jewelry. 

THE DUKE OF WESTMINSTER AND COCO CHANEL
The 2nd Duke of Westminster was renowned for his habit of giving expensive jewellery not only to his mistress but also to his wives.  His second wife, Loelia, writes about his unusual ways of giving jewellery in her memories.  He stashed one of her engagement presents, an oblong platinum powder box with two ribbons of diamonds, and sapphires running across it, in her suitcase.  Later that night she woke up and found she’d been sleeping on a diamond and emerald brooch.  The next morning, when she was fishing in her bag for her passport, she discovered a diamond and ruby bracelet with a long diamond tassel.  His generosity may have stemmed from guilt: he was in the process of breaking off a long-standing affair with Coco Channel.  They had nearly married but she declined, noting: “There are a lot of duchesses, but only one Coco Channel.”  They were a volatile couple and had a famous row aboard a cruise liner.  The duke sought her forgiveness by giving her an emerald that he kept in his traveling safe.  She was standing on deck as he approached her with the stone.  She took it and, without a word, dropped it overbroad.  He married Loelia shortly after.

THE HOPE DIAMOND
The Hope Diamond is probably the most famous jewel in the world, but it has always brought bad luck to whoever owned it.  It originated in India and was sold to Louis XIV.  The bad luck started with his grandson Louis XVI: he and his wife Marie Antoinette were executed in the French Revolution.  The gem disappeared until 1839, when it was sold to Henry Philip Hope of Hope & Co. banking company.  They eventually sold it to pay off gambling debts.  Cartier acquired the diamond in 1910 and sold it to the American socialite Evalyn Walsh McLean, wife of Washington Post owner Edward McLean.  Soon afterwards everyone around her started getting ill or dying.  First her mother-in-law died of pneumonia and then six years later her son was killed in a car accident.  Her husband ran off with another woman and then went on to die from alcohol poisoning.  In 1932 the Post went bankrupt and Evalyn was forced to auction it.  Finally, in 1946, her 25-year-old daughter took a fatal overdose of sleeping pills.  Evalyn herself died the next year, owing money, and the diamond was again sold to pay off debts- to Harry Winston.  Harry Winston, having decided that he didn’t want to have the diamond’s bad luck rub off on him, donated it to the Smithsonian Institution.  He was so unconcerned about the fate of the stone that he is said to have put it in the post.

LA BELLE OTERO AND LIANE DE POUGY
Pairs in the 1890’s was the domain of “les grandes horizontals”.  These glamorous women were high-class prostitutes who only slept with their clients for extraordinary sums of money.  Their favorite watering hole was the restaurant Maxim’s, where the demi-monde used to gather night after night.  Two of the most famously beautiful courtesans were Liane de Pougy and Caroline “La Belle” Otero.  Between them, they’d been to bed with just about every crown head of Europe, and nearly married one or two of them.  Of course they detested each other.  One evening La Belle Otero turned up at Maxim’s wearing a magnificent diamond necklace that a rich admirer had given her.  While the crowd at Maxim’s ooh-ed and ahh-ed over her spectacular new acquisition, Liane did nothing but scowl in the corner.  The next night she appeared dressed entirely in black, without a piece of jewellery anywhere on her.  But behind her was her maid, wearing every single piece of jewellery that Liane owned.

THE DUCKESS OF WINDSOR AND THE DUKE OF VERDURA
The Duchess of Windsor was not known for her tact and never was this trait more visible than when she boasted to everyone that the jewellery she wore was always her own design.  Jewellers would be irritated, but what could they do?  Her patronage was too important to the trade.  Finally, one jeweler decided to teach her a lesson.  Fulco Santostefano della Cerda, the Duke of Verdura , was an Italian aristocrat and a genius when it came to jewellery design.  His work was characterized by witty takes on nature, with motifs of shells, animals, birds, and flowers.  According to Ward Landrigan, the current owner of Verdura, his jewellery complemented the “excellent taste of women who did not need to impress with their wealth”.  The Duke of Verdura and the Windsors were very close-they even took a holiday together.  Naturally, the English duke bought lots of jewellery for the duchess from his Italian friend.  Once he bought her a fabulous ruby and diamond brooch, which the duchess wore everywhere, telling anyone who would listen that she had designed it herself.  Eventually she tired of wearing it and tried to return it to Verdura, hoping he would exchange it for something else.  He promptly told her that, as he only exchanged pieces that he had designed himself, he didn’t think he could take back a piece which he’d heard was her own creation.  She never returned to his shop again.

Captain Underpants

A man was arrested for smuggling 666 rough diamonds in his underpants, in Brazil’s remote Amazon state of Rondonia. 

The police were conducting a routine road check when they became suspicious of “Captain Underpants” nervousness. After finding equipment that measure diamonds in the man’s car the police searched the man finding the diamonds in his skivvies.

The diamonds, worth about $200,000, were smuggled out of the Indian reservation of the Cinta Larga tribe in Rondonia. 

What Kind of Diamond Are You

I found something fun, on Glam.com, “ What Kind of Diamond Are You” quiz.

Which promises to pair the right diamond cut to your personality.

According to the quiz, I am a round brilliant type of girl, which really is not a shocker, seeing how round and oval cut diamonds are my personal favorites. 

TAR-zhay Couture?

Target the pioneer of bringing trend to the masses, has gone couture!  Target, aka Tar-zhay, know for its cheap and chic clothing, sleek and affordable house wares has teamed up with a popular LA boutique to launch an exclusive line of “Targèt (pronounced TAR-zhay) Couture.”

The Target Corporation has licensed its trademark bull’s-eye logo and name to the consulting firm Brand Central LLC.  The line, "Target Couture", launched last month, and is not in actual Targets, but is sold only in the hip Los Angeles shop Intuition.  The line host $330 cashmere sweaters, and if you are after a little Target bling, there is the one-carat diamond necklace which retails for $3,100, the Targèt Couture Pave Swarovski Crystals Clutch with a price tag of $870 and a $136 jeweled red target belt. Tar-zhay Bling

Brand Central believes that Target’s red and white logo has become the symbol of cool, and they are marketing or targeting toward a more trendsetting group.

At the summers end, the line is expected to expand into other boutiques and high-end department stores across the country. 

China's Plan to Cut Diamond Smuggling

China estimates that about 90 % of the diamonds in the country are smuggled in.  In an attempt to cut the widespread smuggling in the country, China will begin July 1, 2006 to exempt imports of uncut diamonds from value-added taxes. 

The finance ministry is reducing the added-value tax on finished diamonds sold through the Shanghai Diamond Exchange from 17 % to 4 %. 

13.6 million carats of diamonds were imported via the exchange last year, earning the Chinese customs 161 million Yuan (US $20 million).  With the cut in the added-value tax, officials believe the change will encourage more dealers to import diamond through legal channels, fighting the rampant smuggling.

The first change in the diamond taxes in the last five years is likely to benefit the diamond dealer rather than the consumers.  The tax reduction is lowering the dealers costs, but will have little effect on the retail value. 

Pan Bin, the chairperson of the Shanghai Diamond Exchange, said that in the last two years, the price of uncut diamonds has jumped by 30%, however the retail price has not kept pace, and as a result the diamond industries earning have remained low, with profits between 3 % and 5 %.

Canada's Confilict Diamonds

Many consumers are buying Canadian diamonds under the pretext that they are conflict free.

Ekati is the largest of the Canadian diamond mines. The mine produces 6 percent of the world’s diamond supply by value or 4 percent by weight and yields 3 to 5 million carats annually. The BHP Billiton the owners of the Ekati diamond mine market their diamonds as “conflict free” compared to the diamonds produced in war-torn African nations.

However, the Public Service Alliance of Canada has launched a “Dirty Diamonds” campaign against the BHP Billiton in the The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, in an attempt to increase public awareness of the ongoing strike at the Ekati diamond mine in Canada. "Dirty Diamonds Ad"

The PSAC is asking consumers not to buy Ekati diamonds. They feel that consumers who care about human rights and the fair treatment of workers anywhere in the world will not want to purchase the Ekati diamonds until the workers have reached a fair collective agreement.

Todd Parsons, President of the Union of Northern Workers, said, “We strongly support efforts to boycott blood diamonds in order to help those diamonds workers around the world get fair treatment. We expect that people who have refused to buy blood diamonds will also want to support our Ekati workers who are on strike exercising their democratic right to join a union and a get a contract.”

Jacob the Jeweler Arrested

In the June issue of JCK magazine, Jacob Arabov, aka Jacob the Jeweler, was accredited with developing the phenomenon known as bling-bling, which is the most high-profile diamond trend in decades.  With little to no industry prodding, the last 10 years have seen hip-hop artist adorn with diamonds but also the embrace of diamonds as part of their lifestyle.  The trend has not been confined only to the artists, but has been embraced by an entire subculture. 

Jacob who reportedly is not only jeweler to the stars but also their friend, has developed a friendship with some unsavory types.  Jacob was arrested on June 15, on money laundering charges, and has been released on a $100,000 bail.  Currently, Jacob is being accredited for accepting “dirty” money in exchange for jewelry and in return not reporting the transactions.

Jacob was arrested in his mid-town store in New York and charged with violating federal drug laws and conspiring to launder over $270 million dollars for the Atlanta-based Black Mafia Family or BMF.  The authorities claim that Jacob conspired to distribute over 476 kilos of cocaine for the BMF. 

Paul Wilmot, the representative for Jacob & Company, told the press that that arrest was “the result of an unfortunate misunderstanding that we believe will be straightened out in the next several weeks.”  Till then, Jacob has been ordered to appear in a Michigan court on July 10, 2006.

Tear-Shaped Gem found in Crater of Diamond State Park

Nine-year-old Courtney Conder, of Grantsburg, Illinois found a 1.11-carat white diamond on June 11, 2006 while visiting the Crater of Diamond State Park, near Murfreesboro, Arkansas with her family.  They spent two days searching for diamonds.  On the second day, about ten minutes into the dig, Courtney found her “Sparkles Diamond” as she so affectionately calls it.  Her diamond appears to be flawless in its rough form. 

Courtney found her diamond near a sign that marks the location where the “Uncle Sam” diamond was found in 1924.  “Uncle Sam”, the largest diamond ever unearthed in the United States, is a rose tinted, white diamond weighting 40.23 carats in the rough , and was unearthed when the mine was privately owned. 

Picture of the Uncle Sam Diamond found at the Crater of Diamond Park.

The Park Superintendent, Tom Stolarz, said that Courtney’s diamond is the 218th diamond to have been found by visitors to the park this year.  People visiting the park may keep whatever they find.

Congratulation's Courtney!