Michael Sang Correa, a former member of Gambia’s military was recently convicted in a Denver federal court of torturing five people accused of involvement in a failed coup against the West African country’s longtime dictator nearly 20 years ago, capping a rare prosecution in the United States for torture committed abroad.

Michael Sang Correa, was a member of Jammeh’s killer Junglers squad that tortured and killed tons of people. Credit-cpr.org

Jurors at the trial in Denver which lasted for a week also found Correa guilty of being part of a conspiracy to commit torture against suspected opponents while serving in a military unit known as the “Junglers,” which reported directly to Yahya Jammeh.

Correa came to the U.S. in 2016 to work as a bodyguard for Jammeh, eventually settling in Denver, where prosecutors said he worked as a day laborer. Correa, who prosecutors say overstayed his visa after Jammeh’s ouster in 2017, was indicted in 2020 under a rarely used law that allows people to be tried in the U.S. judicial system for torture allegedly committed abroad.

He is the first non-US citizen to be convicted on torture charges in a federal district court for crimes committed overseas, according to the Department of Justice. The law has only been used twice since it was enacted in 1994 but both of the previous cases were brought against US citizens.

The Department of Justice had been on Correa’s trail ever since he came into the U.S. and had successfully evaded the authorities until he was eventually captured. The evidence at the trial showed that Correa and his fellow Junglers tortured multiple people accused of plotting a coup to overthrow Jammeh.

The victims included high-profile members of Jammeh’s inner circle who fell out with him and told the jury how they were tortured by being electrocuted, waterboarded and smothered with plastic bags. As it stands he faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison for each of the five torture counts and the count of conspiracy to commit torture.

Correa’s conviction has been greeted with relief by an overwhelming majority of Gambians including victims and human rights activists with renewed calls for the Barrow government to put all other persons recommended for prosecution by Gambia’s truth commission on trial.

Demba Dem, a former member of the Gambian parliament who testified to being tortured by Correa and others, was among those in the packed courtroom to hear the verdict. Dem and other survivors traveled from Gambia, Europe and elsewhere in the U.S. to testify, telling the jury they were tortured by methods such as being electrocuted and hung upside down while being beaten.

Yahya Jammeh is the former president of Gambia who is currently living in exile in Equatorial Guinea. Credit-BBC

Members of the media from Gambia covered the trial in Denver and immigrants now living in the U.S. attended proceedings, including sisters Dr. Jaye Ceesay and Olay Jabbi. They said their brother was killed by Junglers after returning to Gambia in 2013 to start a computer school for children there and they wanted to support others victimized by the regime.

For 22 years Gambians lived under the grip of former president, Yahya Jammeh, whose rule was marked by allegations of human rights abuses including killings, witch hunts and forced labour – although Mr Jammeh has previously denied wrongdoing. Since his shock election defeat more than five years ago, the country has been coming to terms with its painful history.

Jammeh’s reign of terror wasn’t limited to his citizens only. In July 2005, the Human Rights Watch and TRIAL International reported that the Junglers summarily executed more than 50 Ghanaian, Nigerian, and other West African migrants.

Interviews with 30 former Gambian officials at the time, including 11 officers directly involved in the incident, revealed that the migrants, who were bound for Europe but were suspected of being mercenaries intent on overthrowing Jammeh, were murdered after having been detained by Jammeh’s closest deputies in the army, navy, and police forces.

Demba Dem, a former member of the Gambian parliament who was tortured by former Gambian military member Michael Sang Correa, stands outside federal court following Correa’s conviction in Denver. Credit-AP Photo

Martin Kyere, the sole known Ghanaian migrant from that group who managed to survive by jumping off a moving truck that was transporting the group to be executed, has never been the same since his ordeal. He helped Ghanaian authorities identify some of the victims he traveled with and also spent a considerable amount of time traversing all over Ghana to notify families of the victims.

A lot of women also accused Jammeh of rape and sexual assault while he was in office. Former Gambian officials said that presidential aides regularly pressured women to visit or work for Jammeh, who then sexually abused many of them.

Those interviewed made detailed allegations against the former president, saying that he forced or coerced young women into having sex with him. Some were put on the state payroll and worked at State House as so-called “protocol girls.” Former officials reported that Jammeh and his subordinates gave the women cash and gifts and promised them scholarships or other privileges – powerful tools in one of the poorest countries in the world. Witnesses said that both consensual and non-consensual sex took place at the president’s residences.

Last year, Jammeh’s former interior minister was sentenced to 20 years behind bars by a Swiss court for crimes against humanity. In 2023, a German court convicted a Gambian man who was also a member of the Junglers of murder and crimes against humanity for involvement in the killing of government critics in Gambia.

Human rights activists in Gambia hope those who committed torture under Jammeh’s regime will also be held accountable at home.

The defense had argued Correa was a low-ranking private who risked torture and death himself if he disobeyed superiors and that he did not have a choice about whether to participate, let alone a decision to make about whether to join a conspiracy. But while the U.S. government agreed that there’s evidence that the Junglers lived in “constant fear,” prosecutors said at trial that some Junglers refused to participate in the torture.

Massacre survivor Martin Kyere at Accra cemetery where six bodies were returned from Gambia. Credit-hrw.org

A sentencing hearing for Correa will be scheduled after lawyers determine when survivors can return to Denver to speak about the impact of his actions.

Jammeh, a member of the military, seized power in a coup from the country’s first president in 1994 aged 29, and survived three significant coup attempts, making him suspicious of the very military he depended on to stay in power. In 2013, he vowed to stay in power for “a billion years” if God willed it and was eventually forced from power in January 2017 by regional powers after losing elections in 2016. He’s currently living in exile in Equatorial Guinea.