Direct answer: The Madagascar archive currently contains one solved-at-trial case file: the killing of French tourist Sébastien Judalet, Franco-Italian resident Roberto Gianfalla and a Malagasy man on Nosy Be on 3 October 2013. The violence followed unverified rumours surrounding a child's death. In October 2015, 37 defendants stood trial and four received life sentences with hard labour. The archive records those convictions while making clear that only a fraction of the larger crowd was prosecuted.
Original editorial illustration; not a photograph, crime-scene image or depiction of any victim, defendant or physical evidence.
Cases appear here when reliable records establish criminal responsibility through a documented judgment. “Solved” can describe a court outcome even when a collective crime produced only partial accountability.
Documented cases in which criminal responsibility has not been established through a final prosecution and conviction.
A criminal court tried 37 defendants in Antananarivo in October 2015. Four men received life sentences with hard labour and additional custodial sentences were imposed.
Contemporary allegations linked the victims to a child's death, paedophilia and organ trafficking. The page identifies these as rumours and records that a French inquiry found no supporting evidence against Judalet.
Reporting described hundreds of people in the crowd, while only 37 stood trial. The solved label applies to the documented convictions, not to every participant or every unanswered institutional question.
One: the 2013 Nosy Be mob killings and the 2015 trial.
It is classified as solved at trial with partial accountability. Four life sentences and other custodial terms established legal responsibility, but most participants were never comprehensively adjudicated.
A crowd acted on unverified rumours following the discovery of a child's body. The rumours connected foreigners to the death, paedophilia and organ trafficking; they were not proved.
French tourist Sébastien Judalet, Franco-Italian resident Roberto Gianfalla and a Malagasy man identified as the child's uncle.
Thirty-seven defendants were tried, but contemporary reporting described a crowd numbering in the hundreds. Many defendants were acquitted or released.
