Extraordinary Cruelty And Evil  A federal district court has
ruled for the first time that the 1994 Congressional statute
known as “the Torture Act” is constitutional. This statute, 18
USC §2340-2340A, provides that the United States may prosecute
those who have tortured human beings outside the confines of the
United States, so long as the accused is a US national, or found
within the US. The Torture Act was approved by Congress
following the adoption by the United States of the United
Nations’ Convention Against Torture.  The defendant in this
case, Charles McArthur Emmanuel, more familiarly known as
“Chuckie Taylor,” is the son of former Liberian President
Charles Taylor, who is himself currently on trial before an in-
ternational war-crimes tribunal in the Hague. Emmanuel had
argued that Congress im-permissibly exceeded its authority in
approving the Torture Act. But in its 87-page decision in US v.
Belfast II, a three-judge panel of the United States Court of
Appeals for the 11th Circuit told Emmanuel to