Police in Cannes were investigating a string of stolen sewer plates when a search of the suspect's home turned up an unexpected discovery: around thirty Hermann's tortoises, a protected species whose captivity is tightly regulated by French law.
Cannes' Groupe d'Appui Judiciaire had been tracking a series of manhole cover thefts, cast iron plates that fetch a ready price on the scrap metal black market. Officers identified a suspect through surveillance footage and arrested him on July 31, searching his home in Cannes-la-Bocca. The stolen metal was nowhere to be found, but a fenced enclosure in the garden held tortoises of varying ages and sizes, seemingly gathered there over an extended period. Questioned about their origin, the man claimed the animals had been inherited from his grandmother, an explanation investigators greeted with scepticism given that a single specimen can fetch several hundred euros on the market.
The tortoises, naturally found in the Var's Massif des Maures, were taken into the care of SDIS 06's veterinary service and are expected to be transferred to an animal protection association specialising in the species.