Denver (United States) and Banjul (The Gambia), August 26, 2024 – Michael Sang Correa, an alleged member of a Gambian death squad, is scheduled to stand trial for torture starting on September 16, 2024 in Denver. This marks the first time a non-U.S. citizen will stand trial in a U.S. federal court for torture committed abroad.
Mr. Correa is charged with six counts of torture and one count of conspiracy to commit torture. He is allegedly a former member of the Junglers, a notorious death squad in The Gambia operating under former Gambian President Yahya Jammeh. The indictment alleges that following an attempted coup against Jammeh’s regime in 2006, Mr. Correa and other Junglers tortured suspected participants in the coup, including by beating them, suffocating them with plastic bags, and subjecting them to electric shocks.
The U.S. government filed the charges under the extraterritorial Torture Act, a criminal law which allows it to prosecute individuals found within the United States for acts of torture committed abroad. This case has drawn significant attention from human rights advocates and legal experts, as it is the first trial of a non-U.S. citizen since the Torture Act was passed in 1994, and only the third trial under the Act. A coalition of human rights organizations, including the Center for Justice and Accountability (CJA), representatives of the Alliance of Victim-Led Organizations (AVLO), and TRIAL International, played a crucial role in urging the United States to investigate allegations of international crimes attributed to Mr. Correa in The Gambia. CJA represents several of Mr. Correa’s alleged victims.
The trial is a critical step towards securing truth and justice for victims of Jammeh’s dictatorship, which was characterized by widespread human rights violations, including enforced disappearances, torture, extrajudicial killings, sexual violence, and arbitrary detention.
The trial is scheduled to take place from September 16 to 27, 2024, at the Alfred A. Arraj United States Courthouse. The University of Colorado Law School will provide publicly available trial monitoring updates. Representatives from Gambian civil society, including journalists and human rights advocates, will attend the trial in person and provide real-time updates for audiences in The Gambia. Additional information can also be found here.
About the Center for Justice & Accountability
The Center for Justice and Accountability (CJA) is a San Francisco-based international human rights organization dedicated to working with communities impacted by torture, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and other serious human rights abuses to seek truth, justice, and redress using innovative litigation and transitional justice strategies.
About the Alliance of Victim-Led Organisations (AVLO)
The Alliance of Victim-Led Organisations (AVLO) is a coalition of Gambian civil society organizations that has been championing and representing the interests of victims of human rights violations in The Gambia.
About TRIAL International
TRIAL International is an international NGO fighting impunity for international crimes such as genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, torture, enforced disappearances and conflict-related sexual violence. Founded in 2002, it has offices in Switzerland, Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
More Information
Read answers to Frequently Asked Questions here.
Or please contact:
- Rebecca-Paris Senior, The Center for Justice and Accountability, in Geneva (English, French, Italian): rpsenior@cja.org
- Sirra Ndow, Alliance of Victim-Led Organisations, in Banjul (English): avlogambia@gmail.com, 3737766
- Anja Härtwig, TRIAL International, in Geneva (English, French, German): media@trialinternational.org, +41 22 321 61 10
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