According to recently released court records, Salvadoran immigrant Kilmar Abrego Garcia, 29, who had lived for nearly half of his life in Maryland before being deported in March, is accused of transporting undocumented immigrants to the US.
Abrego Garcia was reinstated to the US on Friday, according to US Attorney General Pam Bondi.
Despite a court order forbidding his removal, the indictment against him was filed on May 21 despite a court filing on May 21.
According to a report from the Department of Homeland Security, the Tennessee Highway Patrol conducted a 2022 traffic stop that suspected Abrego Garcia of human trafficking before ultimately issuing just a warning for an expired driver’s license.
A grand jury “found that over the past nine years, Abrego Garcia has played a significant role in an alien smuggling ring,” Bondi said at a press conference.
After American officials presented his government with an arrest warrant, Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele agreed to have him return to the US.
In addition to the Trump plan to deport undocumented immigrants to the country’s Central American nation, Abrego Garcia was imprisoned in the country without the proper process, according to the president’s plan.
Bukele stated in a social media post that his administration cooperates with the Trump administration and would “of course” not decline requests to return a “gang member” to the US.
Deportation is a “distinct legal issue.”
According to Rosiland Jordan of Al Jazeera, Abrego Garcia could receive a fine of up to $2,500 and up to 10 years in federal prison if found guilty.
But “that does not address the ongoing issue of whether or not he should be deported,” she continued. That is a distinct legal issue.
Abrego Garcia will be able to contest the charges in court and in court. According to Bondi, he would be deported to El Salvador after serving his sentence.
Andrew Rossman, Abrego Garcia’s attorney, said it would now be up to the US government to ensure that he received fair treatment.
The administration simply refused to allow him to return, according to Rossman, a partner at the law firm Quinn Emanuel. “Today’s action proves what we’ve known for a long time,” Rossman said.
According to court documents, Abrego Garcia’s deportation defied an immigration judge’s 2019 order barring him from returning to El Salvador, where it was determined that he was likely to face gang persecution if he was.
Trump’s critics cited the false deportation as an example of the Republican president’s aggressive strategy of upholding deportations.
According to officials, Abrego Garcia was allegedly a member of the MS-13 gang. His attorneys have disputed his involvement in a gang and claimed that he has not been found guilty of any crime.
The executive branch and the judiciary, which have ruled against a number of Trump’s policies, have escalated in Abrego Garcia’s case.
Liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor argued that the Trump administration had no basis for what she called Abrego Garcia’s “warrantless arrest,” and that the US Supreme Court had issued an order to facilitate his return.
