El Shafee Elsheikh, a British Isis fighter who was convicted of involvement in a vast hostage-taking scheme that caused the deaths of British, American and Japanese hostages, has been sentenced to life in prison.
Elsheikh, 34, was found guilty of eight counts, including hostage-taking resulting in death, conspiracy to murder US citizens outside of the United States and conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists, following a federal trial in April. He was given a life sentence for each of the charges, which are due to run concurrently.
The Sudanese-born Londoner was part of an Isis hostage-taking cell operating in Syria that was dubbed the Beatles by their captives. Elsheikh travelled to Syria from the UK in 2012. He first joined an affiliate of al-Qaeda, and then later Isis, where he played a key role in an Isis hostage-taking operation.
That kidnapping scheme led to the killing of American journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff, and aid workers Kayla Mueller and Peter Kassig. The conviction also holds him responsible for the deaths of British aid workers David Haines and Alan Henning, and Japanese journalists Haruna Yukawa and Kenji Goto.
Judge Thomas Selby Ellis delivered the verdict on Friday as family members of the victims watched on.
“The behaviour of this defendant and his co-defendant can only be described as horrific, barbaric, brutal and callous,” Judge Ellis said.
“This is a significant episode in the history of our country and our justice system,” he added.
Elsheikh wore a green jumpsuit in the courtroom, with white trainers and a black face-covering, and glasses. He chose not to speak before sentencing, but has indicated that he plans to appeal the sentence and will be replacing his legal team.
Diane Foley, the mother of James Foley, addressed Elsheikh directly in court as she read her impact statement ahead of the sentencing.
“Today is the eighth anniversary of Jim’s gruesome beheading. Knowing Jim, my suffering and that of our entire family would have given him his deepest pain,” she said. “However, Jim would also want you both to know that your hate-filled crimes did not win. James Wright Foley lives on.”
“This trial has revealed the horrific human rights crimes you committed while part of Isis,” she said. “Your hatred overtook your humanity.
“You have been held accountable for your depravity (and) ... you will spend the rest of your life in prison, but you too have lost. You have lost your citizenship, your country ... your family,” she added.
Speaking outside of the courthouse following the sentencing, Ms Foley called it a “hollow victory”.
“Our country has lost four of its very best citizens, we families lost our loved ones forever and now Elsheikh and Kotey have lost their freedom, country and families. It’s a tragic cycle of violence and heartbreak for all involved,” she added.
Ms Foley also called foe the US government to do more to help Americans detained abroad.
“Currently we have more than 67 of our US nationals currently wrongfully detained, held hostage abroad simply for being American. I urgently call on our president Biden to employ our shrewdest negotiation to quickly bring these innocent Americans home lest they die in captivity as our sons and daughters did. Let our country learn from our mistakes,” she said.
Throughout the trial, the jury heard evidence from former hostages, families of his victims, another former Isis fighter and US officials who interviewed Elsheikh following his capture.
The so-called Beatles, whom the prosecution named as Elsheikh, Alexanda Kotey and Mohammed Emwazi, were accused of at least 26 kidnappings in Syria between 2012 and 2015, most of them westerners. Emwazi, who was killed in a drone strike in 2015, was thought to be the ringleader of the group and carried out the executions of hostages.
Kotey pleaded guilty in September 2021 to his involvement in the murders of Foley, Sotloff, Meuller and Kassig, and was handed a lifetime prison sentence by a US judge earlier this year.
Richard Smith, who leads the British Metropolitan Police Counter Terrorism Command, which provided evidence in the trial, said the investigation to bring Elsheikh to justice was “unprecedented in scale, carried out by skilled and determined officers”.
“This is one of the most significant international terrorism cases ever brought to trial. These were some of the most barbaric terrorist acts ever seen, carried out with chilling callousness and brutality,” he said.
In the closing arguments of Elsheikh’s April trial, prosecution attorney Raj Parekh said Elsheikh had engaged in “systematic, premeditated, and relentless abuse and torture” of hostages along with his co-conspirators.
“The evidence demonstrates that they grew up together, radicalised together, fought as high-ranking Isis fighters together, held hostages together, tortured and terrorised hostages together, and after Emwazi was killed, Elsheikh and Kotey were ultimately captured in Syria together,” Mr Parekh said.
Elsheikh’s defence team has denied that he was a member of the Beatles, and instead claimed he was “a simple Isis soldier”. But his own words – information he corroborated in interviews with media outlets while in detention – formed a crucial part of the prosecution’s evidence.
Throughout the trial, the prosecution interspersed testimony from witnesses about their time in the captivity of the Beatles with interviews given by Elsheikh to various journalists.
In those interviews, he named some of the western hostages whom he watched over, admitted to collecting emails for use in ransom notes, and to beating them.
“I’ve hit most of the prisoners,” he told one interviewer, in a video shown to the court. “I did have transgressions. I did transgress physically,” he said, when asked about the beatings.
He also tried to justify his ill-treatment of prisoners by claiming it was necessary to keep prisoners in line because they didn’t have a proper facility to prevent them from escaping.
“Subduing prisoners is used as a preventative of escape,” he said.
Elsheikh’s defence team tried to have those videos thrown out of evidence, suggesting that he was forced by his Kurdish guards to give confessions during his detention. That motion was denied by the judge, who claimed wellness checks by US officials who visited him at the jail showed no signs of mistreatment.
During closing arguments, Mr Parekh said those clips were a key reason why the jury should find Elsheikh guilty.
“Let’s start with the most obvious reason to conclude that Elsheikh was one of the three notorious Beatles: he brazenly told you so himself,” he said. “You’ve watched video clip after video clip of interviews in which the defendant admitted to and described in granular detail his integral and essential participation in the crimes we have charged here, which form the horrendous criminal conduct in this case.”
The jury heard from numerous former hostages of the Beatles, who gave harrowing testimony about their time in captivity.
Federico Motka, a former hostage of the Beatles, who described how he and his fellow captives were given dog names by their jailors, who subjected them to a “regime of punishment” for perceived transgressions.
Didier Francois, a French journalist kidnapped in 2013, gave similar testimony, describing the Beatles as “extremely violent and always sadistic”.
The jury also heard emotional testimony from several family members of hostages that were eventually executed by Isis in gruesome propaganda videos.
Speaking after the sentencing, Carl Mueller, father of Kayla Mueller, said: “I didn’t expect him to speak. He’s been obviously cold, without remorse, throughout the whole trial.
“I still think he believes he was doing the right thing.”
