Kim Kardashian reunites with Kanye West in New York as ex-bodyguard says Paris robbery was inside job
KIM Kardashian begged for her life, telling her armed robbers she had children at home, as more chilling details emerge about the night she was robbed.
KIM Kardashian begged for her life, telling her armed robbers she had children at home, as she was bound, gagged and held at gunpoint.
The thieves were directly targeting the $4m, 20 carat Lorraine Schwartz ring — a gift from husband Kanye West — that the star had repeatedly sported on social media, sources told The New York Post.
The shocking details of the robbery of the world’s most famous TV star emerged as French police probed whether the violent hold up was an inside job facilitated by a plant in Kardashian’s hotel, or associates of her security detail.
As Kardashian returned to Manhattan, the incident was expected to prompt a massive rethink of celebrity security in A-list circles.
TMZ reported that Kardashian told police she believed the robbers were going to rape her when they stormed the apartment and found her alone in bed, before zip-tying her hands.
She was then bound with duct tape, gagged and bundled into the bathroom, with a gun held to her head.
“She had to plead and beg for her life, telling them she was a mother, telling them about her kids,” a source told The New York Post.
Sources told TMZ that Kardashian told police the robbers spoke French, but repeated “ring, ring” as they demanded the $4m, 20-carat Lorraine Schwartz ring gifted to her by Kanye.
Meantime, Kardashian’s long-time bodyguard Pascal Duvier has vowed to track down the five armed gunmen who held the reality star at gunpoint and bound her in a hotel room, saying “you messed with the wrong one”.
And West has cancelled tour dates in the wake of the robbery.
LiveNation, promoter of West’s Saint Pablo Tour, has announced that concerts scheduled for Philadelphia and Detroit this week have been bumped back to December.
The statement from LiveNation cites “family concerns” as the reason for the postponements.
It comes as Kardashian’s former security guard said the jewellery heist was “a crime waiting to happen”.
Kardashian was said to have been hysterical when she called West after the attack. The Daily News reported that she was so “inconsolable” that at first West couldn’t understand what she was saying over the phone.
The reality star broke the news to West in call shortly after the terrifying ordeal.
“Kim was terrified,” an insider close to the rapper told the magazine.
“She was just hysterical when she talked to Kanye. He said she was really upset and it took him a few seconds to understand what she was saying to him.”
TERRIFYING ORDEAL
The reality TV star fled France just hours after she was tied up and held at gunpoint by thieves dressed as cops who stole around $14 million in jewellery, and two smartphones, from her room at the exclusive Hotel de Pourtalès about 3am Monday local time.
Two of the five robbers entered the apartment after threatening the night guard of the hotel with a hand gun and then restraining him.
The five attackers were wearing ski masks and clothes with police markings.
Kardashian had been asleep in just a robe when she reportedly heard the robbers barrelling up the stairs of her apartment, TMZ reported.
Kim’s phone was alleged to have been snatched out of her hands before she could call for help, but her good friend Simone Harouche quickly sprung from her bed downstairs and locked herself in a bathroom, the website reported.
The stylist and long-time friend of the Kardashians called the star’s personal bodyguard Pascal Duvier, who was out at the time. He arrived just after the robbers fled.
During the ordeal the robbers zip-tied Kardashian’s hands with plastic handcuffs, duct-taped her mouth and ankles, dumping her in the bathtub, TMZ reported. The star told police that she feared she was about to be raped, the website said.
💎💎💎 pic.twitter.com/9lcvCP2m7U
— Kim Kardashian West (@KimKardashian) September 29, 2016
When the thieves left with “all her jewellery”, Kardashian “broke out of her bindings and got out,” the source told E! News.
E! News, whose US network broadcasts the Keeping Up With the Kardashians, quoted a source close to Kardashian as saying she feared for her life.
“She begged for them to let her live and (said) she has babies at home ... She thought they were for sure going to kill her,” the unidentified source told E! News.
Investigators say the assailants may have fled on bicycles.
The entire incident took around six minutes, according to TMZ.
Just before the attacks took place Kardashian had been on the phone to her soon to be sister in law Blac Chyna, uploading a video of their conversation to the social site snapchat.
Kardashian, who has two young children with West, was not beaten but the star was “badly shaken” after the attack.
Included in the robbers stash of stolen jewellery was a ring worth about $5.7 million, the Paris police source said. Many suspect it was her engagement ring.
French police are now questioning a photographer who posed as a police officer to spy on Kardashian in a restaurant earlier in the week, The Sun reports. The snapper’s identity has not been released.
Kardashian was in the country for Paris Fashion Week, alongside mother Kris Jenner and sisters Kourtney Kardashian and Kendall Jenner.
GUARD DOWN: ‘Where was pascal Duvier?’
HEIST ‘WAS CRIME WAITING TO HAPPEN’
Kardashian’s bodyguard, pascal Duvier, has come under fire for not being with Kardashian during her nightmarish ordeal. He was reportedly with her two sisters as they partied at a nightclub.
Steve Stanulis, who provided security for Kimye during New York Fashion Week in February for 10 days, and worked with them again around the Met Gala in May, claims the heist was an inside job.
“This was a crime waiting to happen. Kim is lucky to be alive,” he told The New York Post.
“I would say it’s either an inside job or publicity stunt. That hotel is so secure, somebody must have tipped them off that she was alone inside, or shown them a way in.”
Stanulis, who was sacked by West for allegedly getting too close to his wife, said his former bosses don’t take their security as seriously as they should.
“When I worked with them, Kanye would ask me to walk 10 feet behind him, which makes it so hard for anyone working their security to do anything if someone lunges at them. There was numerous times he’d try to ditch his security. He’d jump in a car and tell me to take a taxi,” he said.
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He continued: “They need to pay for an armed security guard. She almost got killed at gunpoint, because she didn’t want to pay for an extra armed and well-trained person. It takes one minute of dialogue to figure out if someone really is a cop, they should not have got in the building.
“Sadly, the only person to blame for this incident, is Kim Kardashian. She has tens of millions of dollars of jewellery, but she can’t pay for an armed guard to protect her? The fact that five days ago that someone broke through her security chain and tried to grab her, then this happened, shows her security is not strong enough, and this should be a wake-up call.”
He said Kardashian brought the robbery on herself: “Kim’s social media and her Snapchat is her undoing. When she is posting, ‘Here I am, and this is the $5 million ring I am wearing, here’s where I am going’, you are basically inviting someone to rob you.”
INSIDE THE LUXURY APARTMENT
The New York Post reports the apartment where the heist went down is owned by Kardashian’s husband, Kanye West. Kardashian reportedly spent a lot of time there before her 2014 wedding to the rapper.
According to another insider, that’s why the robbery could be “was so well planned out.”
“They knew exactly what room, etc,” they said.
The Pourtalès — a 19th-century neo-Renaissance mansion — and known as ‘No address France’ caters to top celebrities like Brad Pitt, Mick Jagger, Leonardo di Caprio and Madonna. Its nine apartments rent for as much as $US17,000 a night, The Telegraph reported, citing The Fab Day blog.
“The address is so secret that you will not find any information on internet. They have no website, no flyers, no telephone number and no street sign,” according to the blog.
“The only way to find them and to reserve an apartment is to use the old and classical word to mouth system,” it wrote.
The complex is said to have secret exits for the A-list clientele.
REALITY STAR FLEES PARIS AFTER ATTACK
Hours after the shocking attack, Kardashian boarded a private jet back to the US with her assistant and bodyguard. The social media entrepreneur was pictured walking to the plane with her head covered with a black scarf.
“She’s very pleased to be heading back to the United States,” a source close to the case said. “She has given a full statement for the police.”
Kendall Jenner left Paris separately on Monday, E! News reported.
West was pictured looking worried as he left his Tribeca apartment in New York to meet his wife.
On Sunday evening he abruptly ended a concert in New York as soon as he heard the shocking news, citing a “family emergency.”
Videos shot by fans at the concert shows the 39-year-old rapper performing the song Heartless when the music suddenly cuts out.
“I’m sorry, there’s a family emergency — I have to stop the show,” he announced, promptly leaving the stage as fans at The Meadows Music & Arts Festival in Queens could be heard voicing their confusion.
Kanye just cut his #themeadowsnyc set short, citing a "family emergency." pic.twitter.com/Yg6VQC5ieQ
— Genius (@Genius) October 3, 2016
Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo condemned the attack via Twitter, saying the Keeping Up With The Kardashians star is always welcome in Paris.
“This very rare act occurred in a private space and does not in any way call into question the work of the police and the security of the public space,” she said.
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