A Maryland judge has ruled that Salvadoran immigrant Kilmar Abrego Garcia cannot be deported to Uganda or elsewhere until at least Oct. 6, when the government must present evidence to justify expelling him.
Maryland District Judge Paula Xinis further ordered that Abrego, who was detained Monday after keeping an appointment with Immigration and Customs Enforcement following his release from a Tennessee jail last week, must remain held in a detention center within 200 miles of where his proceedings are being heard, Univision reported Wednesday.
Abrego Garcia’s attorneys argued that federal agents had not informed them where he would be transferred or why he was detained after a judge had ordered his release. They later confirmed, by searching the ICE detainee locator, that he had been sent to the Abyon Farmville Detention Center in Virginia.
Xinis is also reviewing a habeas corpus petition filed Monday by Abrego Garcia’s lawyers to block his deportation to Uganda, where the Department of Homeland Security has indicated he may be sent.
Abrego Garcia is facing a grand jury indictment for human trafficking, to which he has pleaded not guilty. Trump administration officials also contend that he is a member of the MS-13 gang, a charge he denies.
Meanwhile, his attorneys told Xinis on Wednesday that Abrego Garcia intends to seek asylum in the United States, The Baltimore Banner reported. They argue that the Salvadoran national has the right to express his fear of persecution and torture if deported to Uganda.
Abrego Garcia has also told immigration authorities that, if deported, he prefers being sent to Costa Rica rather than to Uganda.
In 2019, a U.S. immigration judge denied his request for asylum because he applied more than a year after entering the United States. He had left El Salvador at age 16, around 2011, to join his brother, a U.S. citizen living in Maryland.
That immigration judge, however, issued an order preventing his removal to El Salvador. He was granted “withholding of removal,” which shields him from deportation to his home country but allows removal to a third country.
Since the 2019 ruling, Abrego Garcia has been living in Maryland with his American wife and children. He worked as a sheet metal apprentice and held a federal work permit.
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