Third World prisons aren't known for being the most comfortable places, but some are worse than others. One of the worst, it seems, was in Syria, namely the Damascus Central Prison, commonly known as Adra Prison. During the late, unlamented Assad regime, this prison was run by one Samir Ousman Alsheikh, who gained a horrible reputation for torturing prisoners before he fled to the United States.
Now he's on the bottom side of the wheel, as he's facing 60 years in an American federal prison for torturing inmates and for gaming the American immigration system to try to obtain permanent residency and eventual citizenship here.
A former Syrian government official who was the head of one of that nation’s major prisons was sentenced today to 60 years in federal prison for torturing inmates, then later lying about it to United States immigration officials to fraudulently obtain a green card and attempt to naturalize as a U.S. citizen.
Samir Ousman Alsheikh, 74, formerly of Lexington, South Carolina, was sentenced by United States District Judge Hernán D. Vera, who will schedule a victim restitution hearing at a later date.
A federal jury convicted Alsheikh on March 16 of one count of conspiracy to commit torture, three counts of torture, one count of fraud in possession and use of an immigration document, and one count of attempted naturalization fraud. Alsheikh has been in federal custody since July 2024.
The great irony here is that Alsheikh won't face any of the kinds of torture and abuse he was convicted of carrying out in Syria. He will be housed in a warm, decently clean American prison, given three hot meals a day, and receive any needed medical care. He will receive these things that were unheard of in the Syrian prison he once ran because we're not savages, and we don't torture people in our prison system or anywhere else.
However, as came out in the trial, it's not one world.
According to evidence presented at a two‑week trial, Alsheikh was a brigadier general in charge of Damascus Central Prison, commonly known as Adra Prison, from approximately 2005 through 2008, under the regime of then-Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Alsheikh inflicted and ordered subordinates to inflict severe physical and mental pain and suffering on prisoners.
Alsheikh ordered certain prisoners to be sent to a section of the prison known as Wing 13, where they were held in tiny isolation cells and tortured. Victims who refused to harm or kill political dissidents imprisoned with them or who otherwise showed support for those dissidents testified at trial that they witnessed and suffered various forms of torture.
For example, guards used manacles to suspend prisoners by their wrists from pipes on the ceiling for extended periods of time and beat them with fists or cables. One victim testified that he felt like his limbs would be torn from his body when they suspended him for days.
This 60-year sentence means that Alsheikh, who is 74 years old, will almost certainly spend the rest of his life looking at American prison bars from inside. It's hard to imagine any scenario that includes him ever being released. And since he still faces a victim restitution hearing, it appears that any assets he has in the United States may well be confiscated as well.
Samir Ousman Alsheikh is the kind of goblin that all too often bubbles up in totalitarian regimes. But this time, he made the mistake of attempting to flee to the United States. Now, he will spend the rest of his days in an American prison, and that's a good thing.
Editor’s Note: The American people overwhelmingly support President Trump’s law and order agenda.
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