French National Sentenced to Three Months for Defaming NTB Police Chief

The Mataram District Court has sentenced a French national, Ludovic Roche, to three months in prison for defaming a senior police official. Presiding Judge Lalu Moh. Sandi Iramaya delivered the verdict in an online hearing on Wednesday, stating that Roche was proven guilty of insulting and defaming a public official carrying out their lawful duties. The court found Roche violated Article 433 of Law Number 1 of 2023 concerning the Criminal Code. The sentence was less severe than the five-month prison term demanded by prosecutors, who had charged him under Article 433 in conjunction with Article 441 of the same law. Roche, who is married to a woman from North Lombok Regency, was accused of disseminating two defamatory videos, each approximately two minutes long, via his Facebook and TikTok accounts on 29 and 30 December 2025. In the videos, he accused the then-West Nusa Tenggara Police Chief, Inspector General Hadi Gunawan, of protecting drug trafficking operations in North Lombok Regency. He also implicated the North Lombok Police Chief, the Pemenang Police Chief, and a narcotics investigator from the North Lombok Police.