ALEXANDRIA, Va.—More than seven years after humanitarian aid worker Kayla Mueller and others were taken hostage by Islamic State extremists in Syria and killed, one of their alleged tormentors is facing a federal jury in Virginia on charges that carry a life sentence.
El Shafee Elsheikh, who was born in Sudan in 1988 and grew up in London, allegedly supervised detention facilities for the terrorist group and was a member of a cell that murdered U.S. citizens including journalist James Foley and Ms. Mueller in Syria in 2014 and early 2015. The hostages had facetiously referred to their four brutal guards as the “Beatles” based on their British backgrounds.