Brent Bennett is a former

US Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

paratrooper A paratrooper is a military parachutist—someone trained to parachute into a military operation, and usually functioning as part of an airborne force. Military parachutists (troops) and parachutes were first used on a large scale during Worl ...

who was convicted by an

Afghan Afghan may refer to: *Something of or related to Afghanistan, a country in Southern-Central Asia *Afghans, people or citizens of Afghanistan, typically of any ethnicity ** Afghan (ethnonym), the historic term applied strictly to people of the Pas ...

court on 15 September 2004 for participating in torture and kidnapping, and for running a private jail in

Kabul Kabul (; ps, , ; , ) is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. Located in the eastern half of the country, it is also a municipality, forming part of the Kabul Province; it is administratively divided into 22 municipal districts. Acco ...

. Bennett and his associate Jonathan Idema had been operating as independent security contractors in Afghanistan, but had been representing themselves to the American and international media, members of the US military, and Afghan nationals as US government-sponsored

covert operative A covert operation is a military operation intended to conceal the identity of (or allow plausible deniability by) the party that instigated the operation. Covert operations should not be confused with clandestine operations, which are performe ...

s to track and apprehend Osama bin Laden and senior

Taliban The Taliban (; ps, طالبان, ṭālibān, lit=students or 'seekers'), which also refers to itself by its state name, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a Deobandi Islamic fundamentalist, militant Islamist, jihadist, and Pasht ...

officials. The government has repeatedly denied the validity of their claims. Bennett and Idema, along with journalist Edward Caraballo were arrested by Afghan police on 5 July 2004, during a raid in which they found eight Afghan men (some hanging from their feet) bound and hooded in detention. On 15 September 2004 a three-judge Afghan panel headed by Judge Abdul Baset Bakhtyari sentenced both Idema and Bennett to a ten-year prison term, while Caraballo received eight years. Idema and Bennett's sentences were later cut to five and three respectively. Caraballo claimed he was filming Idema and Bennett for a documentary on counterterrorism. Four Afghans working with Idema were sentenced to between one and five years imprisonment. On 30 September 2006, after serving more than two years of his sentence, Bennett was released from prison and flown out Afghanistan. US officials secured Bennett a passport and a ticket out of the country.

References

External links

"U.S. Bounty Hunter on Trial in Afghanistan"
''Soldier of Fortune'' Magazine.

Archived from the original. {{DEFAULTSORT:Bennett, Brent Year of birth missing (living people) Living people United States Army soldiers Place of birth missing (living people) American people imprisoned abroad American people convicted of kidnapping American people convicted of torture American people convicted of war crimes Prisoners and detainees of Afghanistan