NSW police have alleged jeweller Michel Germani helped plan and coordinate a staged armed robbery at his Hilton Hotel store in Sydney’s CBD in January in an attempt to defraud an insurer. 

Germani has been an established Italian brand in Australia since 1985, its website says, and “a household name for fine jewellery” since sponsoring TV show Sale of the Century for 13 years. It says it has designed sapphire and diamond earrings for Princess Diana and jewels for the Saudi royal family and Elizabeth Taylor. 

Robbery and Serious Crime Squad detectives have arrested several men following investigations into the reported robbery, in which Mr Germani, 65, and a female employee were inside the George Street store on the evening of January 19 to help two male customers. 

Officers were told one man threatened the woman with a knife and the other threatened Mr Germani and demanded access to the safe. The pair were restrained before the two men fled the store. 

Police say Mr Germani later lodged a claim for a "substantial amount of jewellery of a sizeable dollar amount" with his insurer, ABC news reports, and that the female staff member had no knowledge of the alleged robbery.  

Mr Germani was arrested on Monday afternoon and has been charged with aggravated robbery and depriving a person of liberty, attempting to dishonestly obtain financial advantage by deception, publishing false misleading material to obtain property, and participating in a criminal group and contributing to criminal activity.  

He appeared at Sydney's Downing Centre court today while detectives executed a search warrant at a home at Canada Bay in Sydney’s inner west. No application for bail was made and he returns to court on Thursday.  

Two men, aged 37 and 57, were charged in April, the older to next appear at Downing Centre Local Court on June 29. 

The Germani Jewellery website says Mr Germani has “extensive experience in creating distinctive, cosmopolitan, unique and exquisite jewellery,” and the store houses a “huge range” of gemstones and loose diamonds. 

His career began with five jewellery stores for Al-Rajhi, owner of the largest Bank in Saudi Arabia, the site says. He is a 1980 graduate of Gemmological Institute of America in Los Angeles and was previously based at the Diamond Bourse in Antwerp and Switzerland before he relocated to Australia in 1985. 

He won the ‘De Beers Diamond Facets’ award in 1989, opened a Circular Quay store for the 2000 Olympics, and has his own perfume, BIJOUX.