Washington (EFE).- Salvadoran Kilmar Ábrego García was released on Friday from a prison in Tennessee, pending a trial on federal human trafficking charges and deportation proceedings, after President Donald Trump’s government was forced to return him to the United States, his lawyers reported.
García, who spent almost three months in the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) after being sent there “by mistake” to El Salvador, was being held in Nashville, Tennessee, where he was brought to face charges for allegedly transporting undocumented people within the US.
“Today, Kilmar Ábrego García is free,” said Sean Hecker, the migrant’s defense attorney.
García is on his way to Maryland to reunite with his family after being arrested, deported, and subsequently imprisoned “illegally,” according to Hecker.
García’s case
Although a migration judge had allowed Ábrego García to stay in the country while his case was reviewed, he was deported by the Trump administration in March.
The US Department of Justice filed human trafficking charges against García after being forced by a court order to return him.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement threatened to detain him for deportation once more if he was released on parole to face his criminal trial.
“This is all due to the government’s vengeful attack against a man who dared to fight against the administration’s continuous attacks on the rule of law,” said Hecker, thanking the US courts for providing his client with due process.
García must face two legal proceedings in two federal courts while on bail.
In the criminal case concerning undocumented trafficking, his lawyers requested the Tennessee court to dismiss the accusation earlier this week, on the grounds of persecution by the DOJ.
They have also filed a complaint by former DOJ prosecutor Erez Reuveni, who claims he was fired for refusing to file a misleading brief in the case.
“This case results from the government’s concerted effort to punish him for having the audacity to fight back, rather than accept a brutal injustice,” his legal team wrote in a motion cited by WUSA9 television.
The tone of the criminal judicial process has become so heated that Judge Waverly Crenshaw, who is overseeing the case, ordered the Trump administration in July to moderate public comments against the Salvadoran migrant to ensure a fair trial.
Ábrego’s lawyers complained to the judge about the “incendiary” comments made by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem about the Salvadoran migrant, who has lived in Maryland, US, with his wife and children for over a decade.
At a press conference in Nashville in mid-July, Noem said, “García is a citizen of El Salvador. It is up to the president of El Salvador to make the decision coming back.”
“It’s been a big topic of conversation between all of us (…) The president has been very clear on this issue, as the secretary of state and I have as well. Ábrego García is not a citizen of this country and is a dangerous individual,” she added.
Other administration officials have also labelled the Salvadoran migrant a “dangerous criminal.”
García’s lawyers stated that these comments had the potential to “taint the jury” and endanger him and his family.
Fight against deportation
The group of lawyers representing the Salvadoran in his Maryland court case has also fought against accusations by the Trump government to deport him, despite the fact that he had a valid work permit until 2029 and an ongoing case in a migration court.
Although he had not been accused of any crimes in the US until then, the government launched a media campaign to link him to the MS-13 gang.
García’s case gained notoriety among opponents of the Trump administration and human rights groups after he was sent to a maximum-security prison in El Salvador alongside hundreds of Venezuelans.
According to human rights organizations, his case has become an example of the “abuses” by the Republican administration against migrants in the midst of mass deportations. EFE
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