New documents detail government's case that mistakenly deported man was a gang member

The Trump administration released a series of documents after weeks of pressure to prove its contention that Kilmar Abrego Garcia was a member of the MS-13 gang.

The Trump administration released documents Wednesday that revealed new details in the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland man deported to El Salvador a month ago in what a government lawyer called an “administrative error.” 

The documents were released after weeks of pressure on the government to prove its contention that Abrego Garcia was a member of the MS-13 gang. The Trump administration sent him to a notorious megaprison in the Central American country as part of its promised deportation program of alleged criminals.  

The Justice Department shared records, not previously made public, detailing how police officers in Maryland assessed Abrego Garcia was a member of the MS-13 gang during an arrest in 2019. He had no criminal history at the time, which the documents also state, and his attorneys have denied that he is a gang member. 

In a document titled “gang field interview sheet,” the Prince George’s County Police Department detailed how in March 2019 it approached Abrego Garcia along with three other people for loitering at a Home Depot parking lot in Hyattsville. Abrego Garcia said in a court filing that he was there looking for day labor work. 

Police said he was wearing “a Chicago Bulls hat and a hoodie with rolls of money covering the eyes, ears and mouth of the presidents” on the bills.