PENNSYLVANIA: A court in Pennsylvania has convicted an American for brutally torturing a worker at an arms factory in Iraqi Kurdistan.
According to AFP, Ross Roggio, 54, faces a possible life sentence after being found guilty of torturing an Estonian man who had raised questions about the arms factory project, and other crimes.
The State Department said Roggio was developing the firm in 2015 to produce advanced M-4 automatic assault rifles in Kurdistan, using parts illegally exported from the United States.
According to the indictment, Roggio arranged for Kurdish armed soldiers to kidnap the Estonian man to prevent him from interfering and raising questions about the project.
The man was detained at the Kurdish military camp for 39 days as Roggio allegedly led multiple interrogations and carried out extreme torture sessions, ordering the armed soldiers to beat him with hoses, use the bag to suffocate him and threaten to cut off his fingers using the cutting tool.
The US State Department said, “At least once, Roggio wrapped his belt around the victim’s neck, yanked him off the ground, and suspended him in the air, causing him to lose consciousness.”
Roggio and his firm were charged in 2018 with 37 counts of illegally exporting firearms parts and tools from the US for the project.
Roggio was convicted of torture, conspiracy, illegal arms exports, money laundering, and smuggling charges on Friday. Only one other American has been prosecuted under the 1994 statute.
In 2009 a US court sentenced citizen Charles “Chuckie” Taylor, the son of ex-Liberian dictator Charles Taylor, to 97 years in prison for acts of extreme torture between 1999 and 2003 in the West African country.
FBI Assistant Director Luis Quesada said, “Today’s milestone conviction is the result of the extraordinary courage of the suspect, who came forward after the defendant inflicted unspeakable pain on him for more than a month.”
Quesada said, “Torture is among the heinous crimes the FBI investigates, and together with our allies at the Human Rights Violators and War Crimes Center, we would relentlessly pursue justice.”
