A former Syrian military official who oversaw a prison where alleged human rights abuses took place has been indicted on several counts of torture after being arrested on visa fraud charges in July, authorities announced Thursday.
Samir Usman al-Sheikh oversaw Syria’s notorious Adra prison from 2005 to 2008. recently expelled President Bashar al-Assad was indicted by a federal grand jury in California on several counts of torture and conspiracy to torture.
“This is a huge step toward justice,” said Muaz Mustafa, executive director of the U.S.-based Syria Emergency Task Force. “The trial of Samir Usman al-Sheikh will reiterate that the United States will not allow war criminals to come and reside in the United States with impunity, even if the victim was not a U.S. citizen. .”
Getty Images
Federal authorities detained the 72-year-old at Los Angeles International Airport in July on charges of immigration fraud, though he specifically denied ever persecuting anyone with a U.S. visa or citizenship application. in syriaAccording to the criminal complaint. He had purchased a one-way ticket to depart from LAX on July 10 and fly to Beirut, Lebanon.
Human rights groups and United Nations officials have accused the Syrian government of perpetrating widespread abuses, including torture and arbitrary detention of thousands of people in detention centers, often without informing families. .
The government fell to a sudden rebel offensive last Sunday, ending the 50-year rule of the Assad family and forcing the former president to flee to Russia. Since then, rebels have released tens of thousands of prisoners from facilities in multiple cities.
In his role as warden of Adra Prison, al-Sheikh is alleged to have ordered his subordinates to inflict pain and was directly involved in inflicting severe physical and mental suffering on prisoners.
According to federal officials, he ordered the prisoners to be sent to a “punishment building,” where they were hung from the ceiling, beaten with their arms outstretched, and fitted with devices that folded their bodies in half at the waist. In some cases, the vertebrae were fractured.
“Our client vehemently denies these politically motivated false accusations,” his attorney Nina Marino said in an emailed statement.
Marino called the case a “misuse” of government resources by the Justice Department to “prosecute foreign nationals for alleged crimes committed against non-Americans in foreign countries.”
In an indictment released Monday, U.S. authorities accused two Syrian officials of running a prison and torture center at the Mezzeh air base in the capital Damascus. The victims included Syrians, Americans and dual nationals, including 26-year-old American aid worker Leila Shweikani, according to prosecutors and the Syrian Emergency Task Force.
Federal prosecutors issued arrest warrants for the two officials, but said they remain at large.
In May, a French court sentenced three senior Syrian officials in absentia to life in prison for complicity in war crimes, in a largely symbolic but landmark case against the Assad regime and the first of its kind in Europe. Ta.
Al-Sheikh began his career in a police command position, officials said, before moving to Syria’s national security services, which focused on countering political opposition. He then became the warden of Adra Prison and Brigadier General in 2005. In 2011, he was appointed governor of Deir Ezzor, a region northeast of the Syrian capital Damascus, where there had been a violent crackdown on demonstrators.
According to the indictment, Alsheikh immigrated to the United States in 2020 and applied for citizenship in 2023.
If convicted, he faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison for conspiracy to commit torture and three counts of torture, and a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison for each of two counts of immigration fraud.
