The jeweler-watchmaker Michel Fréret Roy set up shop in 2005 on rue Danielle Casanova, just steps away from the Place Vendôme in Paris. In his shop window he displays high-end watches and jewelry, which are coveted by passersby. Excluding thefts by deception, he has been robbed three times, most recently in September. Orion Magazine met with him and has decided to publish his testimonial, written in the first person. Do we have to live dangerously? In his eponymous film, Georges Lautner once claimed that we should indeed do so. But it makes me wonder, at a time when public authorities and the media talk of nothing but security... Does life have a different price according to one’s profession?
Now that these preliminary comments have outlined the security landscape in which we live, faced with omnipotent, daily violence, I would like to describe the difficult life of jewelers, watchmakers and other shopkeepers, who are the privileged targets of robberies and hold-ups.
2011-03-03 12:29:08
