Do you have any examples of this happening?
Snowden chose exile over torture, and so has been separated from his family for over a decade.
Many people were tortured that didn't even work as journalists; just victims of bad metadata or the wrong name.
Many countries and organizations even consider so-called "standard practice" in American jails to constitute torture. Solitary confinement, sometimes for years. Refusal of basic medical care, nutrition, sanitation. Physical abuse from guards. Unmarked graves behind the jail [5].
Nowadays even environmental lawyers can get put in jail for the crime of winning judgments against fossil fuel companies (Donziger [6]).
* - Wasn't physically tortured, but he did reveal torture and was heavily retaliated against for his trouble.
...
0 - https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6...
1 - https://theintercept.com/2020/01/02/chelsea-manning-torture-...
2 - https://apnews.com/article/government-and-politics-dd3111dc6...
3 - https://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/06/us/former-cia-officer-is-...
4 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sami_al-Hajj
5 - https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/families-in-disbelief-afte...
6 - https://www.reuters.com/legal/us-supreme-court-lets-chevron-...
Chelsea was published on Wikileaks as well.
Daniel Hale was published on The Intercept. They faced no consequences, but they also failed to protect Hale's identity. Hale was then made into something of an example (despite many honors from people praising his bravery).
Al Jazeera (Sami al-Hajj's publisher) have been repeatedly lethally targeted lately (with US made and funded weapons) without much comment from US media.