Ringleader of global monkey torture network, 'The Torture King', is charged
Ringleader of global monkey torture network, 'The Torture King', is charged
Michael Macartney, 50, confessed to the BBC his role in an extreme monkey torture network.
A ringleader in a global monkey torture network exposed by the BBC has been charged by US federal prosecutors.
Michael Macartney, 50, who went by the alias "Torture King", was charged in Virginia with conspiracy to create and distribute animal-crushing videos.
Mr Macartney was one of three key distributors identified by the BBC Eye team during a year-long investigation into sadistic monkey torture groups.
Two women have also been charged in the UK following the investigation.
Warning: This article contains disturbing content
Mr Macartney, a former motorcycle gang member who previously spent time in prison, ran several chat groups for monkey torture enthusiasts from around the world on the encrypted messaging app Telegram.
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Well I am shocked that a person like this would be A Trump supporter and love the Confederacy. /s
He should be up for now than 5 years. This is completely fucked.
Ironically, his 5 year sentence would be longer than the Confederacy lasted.
Don't worry. Trump supporters will just hand wave this as some sort of false flag.
LMAO, they'll call him a legitimate businessman running a legitimate business, why is the government getting in the way of a stand-up American's monkey-torture distribution network!
Whaaaaat? Confederate and Trump flags? I'm so surprised!
With motherfuckin Ice Cube on a T-shirt that's hanging on the wall, too. Says "Boyz N Da Hood" and everything.
What song of his do you think this POS likes?
That CAT shirt isn't a good look either. That company is full of sadistic fuckers. They'll probably promote him for this.
He didn't do the actual stuff though, he got people in Indonesia to do it.
Congratulations, you’ve figured out what a distributor does.
Okay? People in the comments are talking as if he's the one doing the torturing and killing.
Alternately, you're talking as if facilitating the whole network, including the torturing and killing, is somehow better than doing the actual torturing and killing.
Yes, running chat groups is not as bad as actually torturing and killing monkeys.
This type of comment always really bothers me. You are misrepresenting what is being compared. It's not running chatrooms that is being judged. It's facilitating and organizing the creation and distribution of animal torture content. If he was running chatrooms about my little pony no one would care. Framing it as running chat rooms is dishonest. Flying planes isn't bad. Flying planes into buildings is. Say out loud the part you are trying to to minimize.
How so? I didn't say he ran some innocent or general chat groups, they were obviously involved in horrific shit. You are misrepresenting what I am saying.
Without him the tortures wouldn't have happened or at least be minimised.
So he is directly responsible for the extra torture he himself knowingly facilitated.
Whoa! Look at them go, digging up that goal post! Where y’all think they’ll move it to next?
Willing to say the same thing about child porn and sex trafficking?
Why not? If you do the act yourself it's worse than asking someone. Just like it would be for murder, the murderer gets longer behind bars, this is not surprising.
I disagree
Willingly and knowingly promoting and distributing and organizing inhumane acts is as equally bad as commiting the core inhumane act directly. The goal and impact are equal.
In my opinion there is no spectrum for comparison in inhumane acts. It simple is or isn't.
Hitler was just as inhumane as the ones he ordered to commit the acts.
There is no better or worse, just is or isn't.
Those are fair points. Would, hypothetically, someone who is off the deep end be punished just as badly as someone who decided to follow those words? Or would it depend on their position of authority?
I'd leave that up to judge and jury with real details rather than hypotheticals, but I do think for justice to be accurate the state of mind, intentions, and many other factors should be considered.
I do think a person who was mentally competent, understanding the act is inhumane would get a more harsh justice than a person who wasn't.
I think authority doesn't have a direct role in deciding justice
I don't think following orders is an excuse, each of us has a duty to understand what we are doing and are responsible for the results. but if a person was incapable of understanding the results of their actions that is different from a person who was.
A person who has authority likely is knowing and competent and intentional, and the wider impact of their actions will implicitly have harsher justice without directly considering their authority
Most countries have protections for people disobeying illegal orders, and most countries make inhumane acts illegal so I feel like this well covered.
Was he charged with "running a chat group?" Or "conspiracy to create and distribute animal-crushing videos?"
What did he do?
A ringleader in a global monkey torture network exposed by the BBC has been charged by US federal prosecutors.
Michael Macartney, 50, who went by the alias "Torture King", was charged in Virginia with conspiracy to create and distribute animal-crushing videos.
Mr Macartney was one of three key distributors identified by the BBC Eye team during a year-long investigation into sadistic monkey torture groups.
Two women have also been charged in the UK following the investigation.
Warning: This article contains disturbing content
Mr Macartney, a former motorcycle gang member who previously spent time in prison, ran several chat groups for monkey torture enthusiasts from around the world on the encrypted messaging app Telegram.
The groups were used to share ideas for custom-made torture videos, such as setting live monkeys on fire, injuring them with tools and even putting one in a blender.
The ideas were then sent, along with payments, to video-makers in Indonesia who carried them out, sometimes killing the baby long-tailed macaque monkeys in the process.
According to charging documents, Mr Macartney, who lives in the US state of Virginia, is accused by prosecutors of collecting funds from his chat groups and distributing videos depicting the "torture, murder, and sexually sadistic mutilation of animals, specifically juvenile and adult monkeys".
Mr Macartney has cooperated with investigators from the Department of Homeland Security and agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy charges. He will formally make a plea later this month and is facing up to five years in prison.
Speaking to the BBC Eye investigations team last year, Mr Macartney confessed to his role in the torture network, describing himself as the "king of this demented world".
"I was the man," he said. "You want to see monkeys get messed up? I could bring it to you."
Mr Macartney also described the moment he joined his first Telegram monkey group.
"They had a poll set up," he said. "Do you want a hammer involved? Do you want pliers involved? Do you want a screwdriver?"
The resulting videos were "the most grotesque thing I have ever seen", Mr Macartney said, and yet he went on to become a key player in the monkey torture groups.
The BBC understands that more charges are expected to follow soon for other key players in the monkey torture network. At least 20 people were placed under investigation last year globally, following the BBC's investigation.
Three participants have already been charged in the US, including Mr Macartney. Two torturers were arrested and jailed in Indonesia, and three women have been arrested in the UK, two of whom have been charged.
Holly LeGresley, 37, of Kidderminster and Adriana Orme, 55, of Upton-upon Severn were charged last month with publishing an obscene article and causing unnecessary suffering to a protected animal.
Ms LeGresley and Ms Orme were high-profile members of the online torture groups. Ms LeGresley, who went by the screen name "The Immolator", was a moderator in a group run by Mr Macartney and was involved in commissioning some of the most extreme videos.
In the US, two others have been charged with the same counts as Mr Macartney.
David Christopher Noble, 48, a former US Air Force officer who was previously court-martialed and dismissed from the military, and Nicole Devilbiss, 35. They are both facing up to five years in prison.
Organizing the torture of hundreds of animals is better than torturing one animal yourself?
Good strawman.
You should probably actually learn fallacies before using the wrong one where it is not applicable.
I'm okay, like I said, I have no interest in your responses so you can stop.
I’ll stop when the ignorant are willing to learn.
Lol you have no idea what a straw man is. Cute.
From your response you clearly do not.
Boy are you wrong
Why?
Somebody check this guy's hard drive ASAP. Nobody makes this kind of argument unless they're downloading some deranged shit from Telegram.
You'd be surprisingly bored.
Hitler probably didn't kill many/any of the Jews himself either..
He even was nice to that one little Jewish girl. So obviously, he deserves some slack.
Yes, someone made the same point already.
I think you are projecting. I don’t see that anywhere. Just people saying that the sentence should be longer. Which it should be. It should be considered as something like federal trafficking with a minimum of 5 years and up to 40 years. I bet they would have sentenced him with more than 5 years if it was CP he was trafficking.
Why would you think that? I'm not interested if you think I'm discussing in bad faith.
Yeah, I’m the one arguing in bad faith. This is exactly why I think you are projecting.
I didn't say that. No interest whatsoever in your pisspoor understanding and attempt at using words you do not know how to use.
Lol that’s actually really funny. I know exactly what I said and why. I don’t think you have the reading comprehension to actually understand my words and attempts at using them.
Indeed, your attempts. Again, I have no interest.
You just don’t want to be wrong. Which plays into your projection of ignorant views. Also, do you think I care about your interests?
Read the book Whipping Star. It isn't very long. If you get to the end and can't see the corollary, I'd be happy to point them out to you.
I have too many books and papers on the go at the moment, feel free to summarise it.
Imagine defending the fucking torture king
Imagine imagining that I am.
The comment you originally responded to didn't say that he did the torturing himself, so your unsolicited response that "he didn't do the actual stuff though" absolutely comes across as an attempt to minimize the things that he is accused of doing according to the article.
That sounds like a defense to me. You think we should give him slack because of his distance to the violence he was orchestrating.
No, I do not think that.
Conspiracy then. Just as bad.
How so?
You're overdoing it now.
Overdoing what? If you don't want to engage in discussion you don't have to be here.
Meanwhile, Charles Manson is in prison, even though he never killed anyone with his own hands.
He died like 7 years ago.
In that case he received the same sentence as Atkins, death, commuted to life. Good example, although he was more directly involved due to proximity.
Which adds a while other level of hypocrisy. Why can't he have good ol' Americans do the job? Are they not good enough for him?
Also don't care that he did not directly do it. He was facilitating it and it would not have happened on the same scale without his help. So in essence, he absolutely caused the torture of monkeys. Should someone who goes a hitman not be charged with anything? The hit man isn't killing the victim without pay so obviously the person hiring one should be charged.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-50137450
This was the example which came to mind, where the original person was sentenced with the strongest punishment, then the subsequent people each received subsequently lighter ones.
However this disagrees with my stance, and gave the person who requested a hitman a longer sentence than the two who committed the murder (24, v 16 and 20 years respectively).
I upvoted you, by the way, in case you thought it was me who downvoted.
Wow! When you put it that way he's basically a political prisoner. BRB going to set up a gofundme for this sweet misunderstood angel.