"torturing" is correct and can be used in written English.
It is most often used to refer to the physical or psychological suffering inflicted as punishment or to force someone to reveal information. For example, "The suspect was tortured by police in an attempt to get him to confess to the crime."
Libya's national congress had ordered the defence and interior ministries to find those who abducted Shaban and were suspected of torturing him to death, and had given Bani Walid's militias until last Friday to hand them over.
Traffickers, said by human rights activists to work with local officials and even police, regularly hold their captives to ransom, detaining and torturing them in jungle camps in southern Thailand where authorities have recently uncovered dozens of shallow graves.
(Those bastards at Cadbury have been torturing me lately with their ceaseless innovations, perhaps most deviously by inserting cheese biscuits – cheese biscuits – into their chocolate, with predictably sexual results).
Senussi's name first surfaced in the 1970s when he was involved in arresting and torturing students opposed to Gaddafi.
He spent 10 years as one of El Chapo's gunmen, loading drugs on to planes heading to the US as well as torturing and killing cartel members who stepped out of line.
"These barbarians, they are murdering cartoonists for drawing cartoons they don't like … murdering, killing, torturing Christians, Muslims, other religious minorities.
Prince Nasser is accused of involvement in torturing prisoners.
She also accused the government of destroying churches and torturing Christians.
BFT, founded in 2005, stages fiercely political productions, often directly critical of a regime that, under President Alexander Lukashenko, is accused of torturing and murdering political opponents.
Training is not about killing yourself, it's not about torturing yourself, it's about having fun.
