0:20Kilmar Abrego Garcia exits the Putnam County Jail, Aug. 22, 2025, in Cookeville, Tenn. Brett Carlsen/AP
Kilmar Abrego Garcia, mistakenly expelled in March and then flown back to the United States, was freed from criminal detention in Tennessee on Friday and taken back to Maryland, according to one of his lawyers who spoke to ABC News.
The El Salvador–born man had remained in criminal custody since federal authorities returned him in June to face alien-smuggling counts.
In July, a federal judge instructed officials to deliver him to Maryland and barred the administration from expelling him again upon his release in Tennessee.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia exits the Putnam County Jail, Aug. 22, 2025, in Cookeville, Tenn.Brett Carlsen/AP
In a Friday statement issued by immigrant-rights group CASA, Abrego Garcia declared: “Today is incredibly meaningful because for the first time in over 160 days I saw my family. I’m thankful to everyone who stood by me, because through this entire ordeal I’ve felt waves of support.” The message continued: “I give thanks to the Lord, who listened to my prayers; I am finally free. We are closer to justice, yet full fairness hasn’t arrived.”
His legal team disclosed this week they engaged a private-security contractor to escort him to Maryland.
One of Abrego Garcia’s attorneys told ABC News on Friday that although he is out of detention, he “remains in jeopardy.”
Kilmar Abrego Garcia exits the Putnam County Jail, Aug. 22, 2025, in Cookeville, Tenn.Seth Herald/Reuters
“From March until now, our client Kilmar Abrego Garcia has been apart from his loving family,” attorney Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg said. “While his release offers some relief, everyone recognizes he is far from secure. ICE detention or a one-way ticket to an unknown third nation still loom, ready to rip this household apart again. Some measure of justice has occurred, but the federal government must cease any steps that would once more separate them.”
A source informed ABC News that Abrego Garcia was given instructions to check in at the Baltimore ICE office on Monday.
The release order specifies that Abrego Garcia must stay in the care of his brother in Maryland.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes directed that Abrego Garcia proceed straight to Maryland and telephone Pretrial Services for the District of Maryland no later than 10:00 a.m. on Monday.
Holmes underscored that if “he is placed in ICE custody, he must, under the release terms, consent to being transferred back to this district for additional hearings.”
The bail conditions require Abrego Garcia to report to Pretrial Services as directed, maintain or promptly pursue employment, refrain from acquiring any passport or other international travel papers and complete anger-management counseling.
Additional terms bar him from communicating “directly or indirectly with any known MS-13 associates.”
Should immigration agents apprehend him again after his return to Maryland, Judge Holmes ordered, the United States “must make certain that while Abrego is held by ICE he retains both physical and telephone access to his attorneys so he can fully prepare for the upcoming trial.”
On Friday, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem denounced Abrego Garcia’s release, declaring, “Activist liberal judges continue blocking law-enforcement efforts to expel the most dangerous criminal illegal immigrants.”
She continued, “Today marks a disgraceful low as this headline-seeking Maryland judge frees an unlawful alien labeled an MS-13 gangster, human smuggler, repeat domestic-violence offender, and child predator.”
In her July ruling, U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis stated the federal government “must reinstate Abrego Garcia to the ICE Order of Supervision issued by the Baltimore Field Office.”
Xinis held her directive to transfer oversight to Maryland — where he lived with his spouse and children before his erroneous March removal — is needed to “provide the effective remedy to which a wrongly deported individual is entitled upon being returned.”
That July order, which further obliges the government to supply 72 hours’ notice if it intends to banish Abrego Garcia to another nation, is “narrowly designed” to leave the Trump administration free to institute “lawful removal procedures once Abrego Garcia is back in Maryland.”
Such proceedings could involve “legal arrest, detention, and eventual removal,” the judge noted.
Abrego Garcia was flown to El Salvador’s CECOT mega-prison in March — in defiance of a 2019 order prohibiting his deportation there over persecution fears — after the Trump administration alleged he belonged to the MS-13 organization, a claim his relatives and counsel dispute.
He was returned last month to answer charges in Tennessee that he allegedly transported undocumented individuals inside the United States while residing in Maryland. He has entered a plea of not guilty.
On Tuesday, his lawyers alleged “vindictive and selective prosecution” in a 25-page motion asking the court to toss the indictment.
In the filing, they contend the prosecution was launched because their client “refused to surrender his constitutional due-process rights.”
"The United States government has singled out Kilmar Abrego Garcia for disparate treatment,” his attorneys contended.
Abrego Garcia’s trial on the alleged human-smuggling charges is set for Jan. 27, 2027.
Sourse: abcnews.go.com
