Samir Ousman Alsheikh, 74, a former Syrian prison warden and provincial governor, was sentenced today to 60 years in prison for torturing prisoners and lying to U.S. immigration officials to gain entry to the United States.
A jury found Alsheikh guilty in March 2026 of one count of conspiracy to commit torture, three counts of torture, one count of visa fraud, and one count of attempted naturalization fraud. Evidence presented during the trial showed that Alsheikh ordered and participated in the torture of prisoners while he was the head of Adra Prison, also known as Damascus Central Prison, outside of Damascus, Syria, from approximately 2005 to 2008. He committed human rights atrocities in Syria, including to silence political dissent, and he lied about his past to gain entry to the United States in 2020.
“Samir Alsheikh is the highest-ranking former member of the Assad regime to be tried and convicted in person outside of Syria,” said Assistant Attorney General A. Tysen Duva of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division. “He now answers to the United States justice system. The message is clear: human rights violators who come to the United States will receive no safe harbor here. We will find them, and they will be prosecuted and punished for their heinous crimes. The conviction in this case is a testament to the courage of his victims; the tenacity of our prosecutors, agents, and historians; and to the extraordinary cooperation and professionalism of Germany’s Federal Criminal Police Office in arranging for us to meet with many witnesses in Germany.”
“Criminals who inflict the type of savage brutality that this defendant did on his victims must never be granted refuge in our country,” said First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli for the Central District of California. “We hope today’s sentence gives some semblance of healing and closure to this defendant’s victims.”
“This conviction stands as a powerful reminder that Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) will relentlessly pursue those who believe they can escape the consequences of their atrocities by hiding within our borders,” said Acting Special Agent in Charge Erin Burke of the HSI Los Angeles Field Office. “While the defendant may have thought his actions in Syria’s Adra Prison were forgotten by time, our agents and partners ensured they were not. Through the tireless work of HSI’s Human Rights Violators and War Crimes Center and our collaborative efforts with the FBI and international partners, we have ensured that justice was served. The United States will never be a safe haven for human rights abusers, and we will continue to hold them accountable, no matter how much time has passed.”
“If you engage in torture and come to the United States, the FBI and its partners are going to ensure that you face the consequences for your illegal disregard for human rights,” said Assistant Director Heith Janke of the FBI Criminal Division. “The acts Alsheikh ordered and directly participated in are gruesome and disturbing. We would like to offer our gratitude to the brave victims who testified leading to today’s sentencing. We hope that they are able to find some solace in the fact that it will now be their former prison warden who is incarcerated.”
Depiction of hinged wooden device known as “the Flying Carpet”
Three of Alsheikh’s victims testified at trial about being tortured themselves and seeing and hearing the torture of other prisoners. The victims were fastened to a device, known as the “Flying Carpet,” that forcibly folded their bodies in half at the waist, manacled to the ceiling and suspended for days or hours, savagely beaten while immobilized inside tires, and packed into tiny, filthy, cold, wet cells that were infested with insects and other vermin.
According to evidence presented at trial, when two prisoners refused Alsheikh’s orders to harm political prisoners who were also housed at Adra Prison, and after a third prisoner’s letter of support to a political prisoner was intercepted by prison guards, Alsheikh ordered the prisoners to be sent to an underground section of the prison known as Wing 13, where they were held in tiny cells and tortured.
Evidence presented during the trial also established that Alsheikh lied to U.S. immigration authorities about his background to obtain a green card and on an application to naturalize as a U.S. citizen. Alsheikh entered the United States in 2020 and has been in custody since his arrest in July 2024.
Trial Attorney Patrick Jasperse of the Criminal Division’s Human Rights and Special Prosecutions Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Joshua O. Mausner for the Central District of California prosecuted the case, with assistance from HRSP Historian/Analyst Philip Hoffman and the Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs.
In addition to HSI Los Angeles and FBI Chicago, HSI’s Human Rights Violators and War Crimes Center (HRVWCC) also significantly supported the case, along with the FBI’s International Human Rights Unit (IHRU). Established in 2009, the HRVWCC furthers the government’s efforts to identify, locate, and prosecute human rights abusers in the United States, including those who are known or suspected to have participated in persecution, war crimes, genocide, torture, extrajudicial killings, female genital mutilation, and the use or recruitment of child soldiers.
Members of the public who have information about former human rights violators in the United States are urged to contact U.S. law enforcement through the HSI tip line at 1-866-DHS-2-ICE (1-866-347-2423) or internationally at 001-1802-872-6199. They can also email [email protected] or complete its online tip form at www.ice.gov/exec/forms/hsi-tips/tips.asp.