Thief employs classic switch move to steal £200,000 ring from Tiffany store

A jewel thief wanted in connection with crimes committed from Florida to South Korea stole a diamond ring worth 255,000 dollars (£200,000) from a Tiffany store in New York by switching it with a cubic zirconia replica, authorities have said.

The theft took place on March 4 at a store in Manhattan’s Rockefeller Centre complex, according to a criminal complaint filed by the district attorney’s office.

Yaorong Wan, 49, asked an employee to let him see several pieces, including the quarter-million-dollar ring, according to the complaint. He left without buying anything and the employee put the ring back in the display case.

A week later, employees discovered during a routine inventory that the diamond ring had been replaced with a fake with a cubic zirconia stone.

Detectives viewed surveillance footage from the store and saw Wan slip the genuine ring into his palm and switch it with the fake, according to the complaint.

Wan is also charged with stealing a diamond ring worth 25,000 dollars (£20,000) from a Cartier store in the Hudson Yards complex in Manhattan on March 12.

In the second case he pocketed the ring and did not leave a fake in its place, according to the complaint.

Wan was arrested on Friday and arraigned on Saturday in Manhattan criminal court on grand larceny charges.

He has open arrest warrants in New Jersey and in Nassau County on Long Island, is a suspect in thefts from Cartier stores in California and Florida, and also is wanted in South Korea on suspicion of stealing from high-end jewellery stores, assistant district attorney Eliana Ramelson said at his arraignment.