El Shafee Elsheikh has alleged he was tortured into confessing to crimes.
A British former member of the Islamic State has sought to minimize his role in the captivity of journalists and aid workers, several of whom were killed. But in 2018, court records show he told Department of Defense investigators he was intimately involved in ransom negotiations and privy to details of some hostages’ deaths.
El Shafee Elsheikh, who is facing a January trial in Alexandria federal court, is accused of being part of a notorious quartet of ISIS hostage-takers, known as “The Beatles” because of their British accents.
The man who beheaded some of those hostages in horrific propaganda videos, Mohammed Emwazi, died in a drone strike in 2015. Conspirator Alexanda Kotey has pleaded guilty in Alexandria federal court. A third is imprisoned in Turkey. Elsheikh’s trial will be the first and possibly last time much of the evidence against the group is aired in public.
