Prince Yormie Johnson, the former Liberian warlord notorious for overseeing the torture and execution of President Samuel Doe in 1990, died Thursday at age 72, officials confirmed.
Johnson, who became an influential senator and evangelical preacher after the civil wars, died at Hope for Women health center, according to Wilfred Bangura, a senior official in Johnson’s Movement for Democracy and Reconstruction party.
“Senator Johnson was the longest-serving senator,” said Siaffa Jallah, deputy director of press at the Senate. The cause of death was not disclosed.
Johnson gained international infamy from video footage showing him sipping beer while his fighters tortured President Doe to death, an event that helped plunge Liberia into two civil wars from 1989 to 2003. The conflicts killed approximately 250,000 people and devastated the country’s economy.
The former warlord from Nimba region later transformed himself into an evangelical preacher with considerable popular support, while actively opposing the establishment of a tribunal to try civil war crimes.
