France’s President Emmanuel Macron on Friday condemned “unacceptable” lapses within the judicial system over an 11-year-old girl’s likely killing, after it emerged that the main suspect was previously accused of sexually abusing children.
A girl, named in the press only as Lyhanna, went missing on May 29 near the southwestern town of Fleurance after she was last seen getting into a man’s car.
After days of combing the countryside, investigators found her body in an abandoned silo in the nearby village of Puycasquier on Thursday.
A DNA test confirmed it was her, but forensic doctors could not yet find the cause of death, a prosecutor said on Friday evening.
A 41-year-old father of two, whose daughter was a school friend of Lyhanna, has been detained as the key suspect.
It emerged this week that he had twice previously been accused of raping a child but the investigations had either been dropped or stalled.
“It is clear that there has been a dysfunction,” Macron said in Montenegro, where he was attending a European summit. “It’s unacceptable.”
Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu told his justice, interior and budget ministers at an emergency meeting that he was “particularly shocked” by the case and requested to see the initial findings of an administrative probe within two weeks, his office said.
Justice Minister Gerald Darmanin apologised on the evening news to the French public for what he called a “huge failure”.
“The judicial system failed to protect this little girl,” he said.
‘Makes me angry’
Earlier in the day in Fleurance, 79-year-old retiree Paulette Cantan said she was upset.
“With all those complaints, there’s clearly a failure somewhere and that really makes me angry,” she said, as her town planned a silent march in memory of the victim on Sunday.
Prosecutor Clemence Meyer on Wednesday listed the previous complaints against the suspect.
In December 2017, a mother reported that her 17-year-old daughter was in a relationship with the man. The case was dropped in 2018 after the girl said she had consented.
In January 2022, a complaint accused him of raping a child younger than 15 in 2020 at his home. The case was dismissed in 2024 for lack of evidence.
In a third case, on August 22, 2025, the mother of a girl born in 2014 accused him of raping her child between September 2024 and May 2025 at his home, the prosecutor said.
But police still had not questioned him when 11-year-old Lyhanna disappeared nine months later.
A new complaint for the alleged rape of a minor had been filed on Wednesday, Meyer said, but provided no further details.
Another complaint accusing the main suspect of raping a child in 2023 was filed on Thursday evening, after she told her mother she recognised him in media coverage, an informed source told AFP on Friday.
The mayor of Fleurance, Gregory Bobbato, on Thursday said there was something deeply wrong with the way investigations were conducted.
“Must we always wait for fully established evidence to be produced before finally doing something to protect our children?”
Denis Roth-Fichet, of an independent commission on the sexual abuse of children called CIIVISE, told AFP the case was illustrative of a much wider problem.
Investigations are dropped for almost three out of four complaints for alleged sexual abuse of a minor, he said.
Only seven percent of complaints for sexual assault of a minor — and three percent of those for rape of a child — result in a conviction, according to the CIIVISE.
‘Check this man’s computer’
Candidates for next year’s presidential elections have also weighed in.
Centre-right hopeful Edouard Philippe, a former prime minister, on Thursday called for investigations to be sped up to better protect children.
After a child’s testimony, “why doesn’t the entire state apparatus immediately go on alert?” he asked.
Far-right contender Jordan Bardella, who has been leading in the opinion polls and will run if Marine Le Pen is banned from office, said the crime “could have been — should have been — avoided”.
Anne-Cecile Mailfert, of the Women’s Foundation activist group, earlier this week said the judicial system was failing in protecting children — even when a child was brave enough to speak up.
“The system doesn’t work,” she said.
Michele Creoff, of the Union for Childhood association, was also indignant.
“Did anyone go and check this man’s computer? The websites he visits?” she asked.
