William Sampson

The government of Saudi Arabia claimed he was a terrorist guilty of killing another Westerner in a turf war over illegal alcohol. With no proof other than a coerced confession, Canadian William Sampson was sentenced to have his head cut off in public.

Free at last after more than two years of torture and solitary confinement in a Saudi prison, his compelling and incredible story has been featured in the pages of the National Post, Readers Digest, on CBC’s “Newsworld,” and around the world.

An adventurer at heart, in 1999 William and his father James took a four-wheel drive into the desert and followed T.E. Lawrence’s route along the old Hejez railway between Damascus and Mecca where Lawrence wreaked havoc on the Ottoman Turks who had ruled the Arab world for centuries.

They’ve also climbed mountains together and in 1989 William Sampson saved the life of his father – who would reciprocate years later by fighting fiercely for his son’s release – after the elder Sampson fell into a crevasse in Switzerland.

A pharmaceutical engineer by trade, Sampson earned his B.Sc. at London University, a Ph.D. in biochemistry and an MBA at Edinburgh University.