U.S. charges 2 British ISIS members alleged to be part of execution team

The U.S. Justice Department unsealed charges Wednesday against two Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) militants from Britain, accusing them of carrying out a gruesome campaign of torture, beheadings and other acts of violence against Western hostages they had captured in Syria, including four Americans.

El Shafee Elsheikh and Alexanda Kotey are two of four men dubbed "the Beatles" by the hostages they held captive because of their British accents. They are expected to make their first appearance in the afternoon in federal court in Alexandria, Va., where a federal grand jury issued an eight-count indictment.

The charges include conspiracy to murder American citizens outside the United States, conspiracy to commit hostage taking resulting in death, hostage taking resulting in death, conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists resulting in death and conspiracy to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization.

The two men face the possibility of life in prison if convicted.

"Today is a good day, but it is also a solemn one," John Demers, assistant attorney general for national security in the Justice Department, said at a news conference on Wednesday.

"These terrorists despise the freedoms and the way of life we cherish and are hellbent on imposing their ideologies on a world that continues to reject them."

The charges are a milestone in a years-long effort by U.S. authorities to bring to justice members of the group known for beheadings and barbaric treatment of aid workers, journalists and other hostages in Syria. Their arrival in the U.S. sets the stage for arguably the most sensational terrorism trial since the 2014 criminal case against the suspected ringleader of a deadly attack on the diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya.

Videos of the killings, released online in the form of ISIS propaganda, stunned the U.S. government for their unflinching violence. The recordings routinely showed prisoners in orange jumpsuits on their knees beside a captor dressed in black whose native English drove home the global reach of a group that at its peak occupied vast swaths of Syria and Iraq.

The defendants are charged in connection with the deaths of four American hostages — journalist James Foley, journalist Steven Sotloff and aid workers Peter Kassig and Kayla Mueller — as well as British and Japanese nationals who had been captured.

The indictment describes Kotey and Elsheikh as "leading participants in a brutal hostage-taking scheme targeting American and European citizens" from 2012 through 2015. It accuses them of working closely with a chief ISIS spokesperson who reported directly to then-ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi,

In July 2014, according to the indictment, Elsheikh described to a family member his participation in an Islamic State attack on the Syrian Army. He sent the family member photos of decapitated heads and said in a voice message, "There's many heads, this is just a couple that I took a photo of."

While the 24-page indictment describes Kotey and Elsheikh as co-ordinators of ransom negotiations conducted by email, it does not spell out their specific roles in any of the executions and other deaths.

U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia G. Zachary Terwilliger, whose office will prosecute the case, said under U.S. law Elsheikh, 32, and Kotey, 36, can "be held liable for the foreseeable acts of their co-conspirators."

Pledge to not seek death penalty

Elsheikh and Kotey have been held since October 2019 in American military custody after being captured in Syria one year earlier by the U.S.-based Syrian Democratic Forces. The Justice Department has long wanted to put them on trial, but those efforts were complicated by wrangling over whether Britain, which does not have the death penalty, would share evidence that could be used in a death penalty prosecution.

Attorney General William Barr broke the diplomatic standoff earlier this year when he promised the men would not face the death penalty. That prompted British authorities to share evidence that U.S. prosecutors deemed crucial for obtaining convictions.

In interviews while in detention, the two men admitted they helped collect email addresses from Mueller that could be used to send out ransom demands. Mueller was killed in 2015 after 18 months in ISIS captivity.

The State Department described their conduct in terms not nearly so benign. The agency declared Elsheikh and Kotey as specially designated global terrorists in 2017 and accused them of holding captive and beheading approximately two dozen hostages, including the Americans.

Officials repeated the allegation that Baghdadi, killed last year in a U.S. airstrike, sexually assaulted Mueller while she was in captivity.

At the news conference, FBI Director Christopher Wray said the four Americans "were like so many of your own sons and daughters."

"They were four unique passionate young Americans, and all risked their lives pursuing a greater good," said Wray.

He hailed the "unflagging efforts" of their British counterparts helping build the cases against Elsheikh and Kotey and expressed condolences over British victims David Haines and Alan Henning, who were both beheaded after being captured in 2014.

British Conservative MP Sajid Javid, former Home Secretary who was among those specifically thanked by Wray, said in a social media post: "ISIS revelled in the kidnap and murder of these US & UK citizens – and many others. Now it's time for the executioners to face justice, after years of work by UK and US partners."

The State Department has said Elsheikh "was said to have earned a reputation for waterboarding, mock executions and crucifixions while serving as an ISIS jailer."

Kotey, according to the State Department, acted as an ISIS recruiter and "likely engaged in the group's executions and exceptionally cruel torture methods, including electronic shock and waterboarding."

In a statement, relatives of Mueller, Foley, Sotloff and Kassig said the transfer "will be the first step in the pursuit of justice for the alleged horrific human rights crimes against these four young Americans."

"We are hopeful that the U.S. government will finally be able to send the important message that if you harm Americans, you will never escape justice. And when you are caught, you will face the full power of American law," the statement said.

The other two Beatles included the most infamous member of the group, Mohammed Emwazi, known as "Jihadi John," who was killed in a 2015 drone strike. Emwazi appeared and spoke in the video of Foley's execution. The fourth member, Aine Lesley Davis, was sentenced to seven years in prison in Turkey in 2017.