Salvadoran migrant Kilmar Abrego Garcia was released from federal custody Friday in Tennesee and is slated to return to his family in Maryland, though his legal proceedings are far from over.

Abrego Garcia, who was charged earlier this year with transporting illegal migrants in the U.S., will remain under the custody of his brother.

The criminal investigation that resulted in those charges, stemming from a 2022 traffic stop, was later revealed to have begun while he was detained in El Salvador, raising questions about the nature of the probe.  

U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes on Friday entered a new federal court order in the Middle District of Tennessee detailing certain conditions of his release from federal custody, where his attorneys had asked that he be held in custody for an additional 30 days, citing fears that he would immediately be arrested by ICE and deported again— this time to a third country, such as Mexico or South Sudan.

The order Friday codifies certain conditions of Abrego Garcia's release. It clarifies that he should be placed in the custody of his brother— who is his designated third-party custodian— prior to trial. Abrego Garcia will also be required to wear an electronic monitoring device, and report to Pretrial Services for the District of Maryland ahead of his trial.

He must report there no later than 10 a.m. on Monday, August 25, Judge Holmes said. 

"Thereafter, Abrego must remain in the custody of his brother as the designated third-party custodian and in compliance with all conditions of pretrial release," she said in her order.

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The Justice Department had argued against his release, alleging he was a danger to the community.

But both U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes and U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw separately determined that Abrego Garcia was eligible to be released from criminal custody pending trial.

Judge Crenshaw noted in a 37-page ruling that the Justice Department "fails to provide any evidence that there is something in Abrego’s history, or his exhibited characteristics, that warrants detention." 

Judge Holmes in July also agreed to stay his release from federal custody for 30 days, granting a request made by Abrego Garcia's attorneys, who had cited fears that ICE would detain him and immediately begin the process to remove him to a third country.

Justice Department officials told a federal judge in Maryland at a hearing last month that they planned to immediately take him into ICE custody pending his release from U.S. Marshal custody and deport him to a third country, regardless of the status of his criminal case.

"There’s no intention to just put him in limbo in ICE custody while we wait for the criminal case to unfold," a lawyer for DOJ told the court.

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That judge, U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis, later issued an order blocking ICE  from immediately deporting Abrego Garcia if and when he is released from federal custody.

Judge Xinis, who since March has presided over the separate, months-long civil case involving Abrego Garcia that was brought by his family in March, also ordered the administration to give Abrego Garcia a 72-hour notice period before beginning any deportation proceedings, in order to allow him access to his counsel, as well s the ability to challenge his removal to a third country.

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Abrego Garcia was deported to El Salvador in March in violation of a 2019 court order, and in what Trump administration officials later acknowledged was an "administrative error."

Abrego Garcia entered the country illegally more than a decade ago and had been living in Maryland with his wife and child when authorities deported him to a maximum security prison in El Salvador in March.

Trump officials have repeatedly alleged that Abrego Garcia is a vicious MS-13 gang member — a notion U.S. Judge Waverly Crenshaw, who has overseen his criminal case in Tennessee, dismissed as "fanciful."

Earlier this week, Abrego Garcia's attorneys filed a motion to dismiss the criminal case against him, arguing in a new court filing that the criminal case by the Trump administration amounts to a "vindictive" and selective prosecution.

"Those motions are infrequently made and rarely succeed," they acknowledged. "But if there has ever been a case for dismissal on those grounds, this is that case."

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