“Mo’nn aprann li’nn pik so lizie, koup so lagorz, anter li dan so lakour. Apre enn semenn li’nn deter li, koup li ankor bout bout..." Noël Clovis pauses. Sixty-five years, a father's life reduced to that one sentence, spoken in a low voice, as if saying it too loudly made the images even more real. “Ki kalite dimounn sa. Si mo ti ankor zen... Pa kav found li divan mo lizie, si fode mwa ki al ferme. I will no longer answer for myself. »
His son's name was Jayce Donovan Clovis. He was 28 years old. He left his home on February 22, 2022, in Pointe-aux-Piments, to follow a friend, Michel William Sanassee, 27 years old. He never came home. Four years later, on Wednesday April 8, William Sanassee was sentenced to life imprisonment by the Assize Court. He confessed to the murder. He admitted to having consumed part of his victim's flesh. “Mo latet fatigue,” said Noël.
This day in February 2022, Noël was at work when everything changed. William came by the house in the morning. The two young men left together. In the evening, Donovan did not come home. His father first thought that he had perhaps joined his mother in Grand-Baie. Then, the hours passed. Then, the days.
From the start, one name was running through Noel's head: William Sanassee. He went to tell the police. He was told he had no proof. William was heard, denied everything. “I saw him walking freely,” says Noël. That image – his son’s friend, free, in the neighborhood streets – haunted him for months.
Refusing to stop there, he knocked on the door of a hotel near the villa where William Sanassee lived, in Pointe-aux-Biches. The surveillance cameras gave him what he was looking for: they showed Donovan and William walking together that day. “My son had little idea that he was never going to come back. »
The weeks passed. Then the months. Noël waited, without response, without arrest, without body. At some point, the wait started to work on his mind from the inside. “In the house, I would sometimes see Donovan sitting in the chair across from me in the kitchen. But the next moment he disappeared. When I recounted this incident, I was told that my son was no longer in this world. » He saw his son dead without yet being able to know it. His mind had already understood what words could not yet say.
It was the Major Crime Investigation Team that finally brought the truth to light. William Sanassee had fled to Rodrigues. Caught, brought back to Mauritius, subjected to interrogation, he ended up confessing. Donovan had been killed in the villa in Pointe-aux-Biches. The body was buried in the courtyard. Then dug up. Then cut out.
The police dug. The events took place almost two years ago, and only bones remained. DNA tests have been carried out. In November 2024, confirmation came.
“Li bizin close mem a-vi. Kanibal, manz dimounn. Mo’nn frisone kan mo’nn t
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