Papillon: The Murder, the Bagne, and the Butterfly Who Wouldn’t Stay Caged
In 1930 Paris, a single gunshot in Montmartre kills a pimp named Roland Legrand. The dying man names his killer: “Papillon.” Police arrest Henri Charrière, a young safecracker with a butterfly tattooed on his chest. He swears he’s innocent. The courts give him life at hard labor in the infamous French Guiana penal colony.
What follows is one of true crime’s most legendary — and most disputed — stories: daring escapes, years in solitary, a coconut raft through shark waters, and a bestselling memoir that may have stolen other men’s lives.
Host Alexander Lawson examines the crime, the…
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