A man who was wrongly deported to El Salvador by the Trump administration has been threatened with removal again, according to a court filing by his lawyers.

Kilmar Abrego Garcia, 29 and originally from El Salvador, has been charged in an indictment filed in federal court in Tennessee with conspiring to transport illegal immigrants into the US.

He was released from federal detention on Friday after being held since March, when he was arrested and then deported back to his home country by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials.

In a new filing to the Tennessee court on Saturday, Mr Garcia’s defence lawyers said that immigration officials threatened the 29-year-old with deportation to Uganda earlier in the week.

According to the filing, while he was held in Putnam County Jail on Thursday, Mr Garcia declined an offer to be deported to Costa Rica in exchange for pleading guilty to human smuggling charges and remaining in prison.

After he left jail on Friday, ICE notified his attorneys that he would be deported to Uganda and should report to immigration authorities on Monday.

That same day, the Trump administration “informed Mr Abrego that he has until first thing Monday morning – precisely when he must report to ICE’s Baltimore Field Office – to accept a plea in exchange for deportation to Costa Rica, or else that offer will be off the table forever”.

Filed along with the brief was a letter from the Costa Rican government stating that Mr Garcia would be welcomed to that country as a legal immigrant and wouldn’t face the possibility of detention.

Justice Department spokesperson Chad Gilmartin responded in a statement and said: “A federal grand jury has charged Abrego Garcia with serious federal crimes… underscoring the clear danger this defendant presents to the community.

“This defendant can plead guilty and accept responsibility or stand trial before a jury. Either way, we will hold Abrego Garcia accountable and protect the American people.”

Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, one of Mr Garcia’s attorneys, said he would “fight tooth and nail against any form of deportation to Uganda” or nearby countries in Africa.

“It is preposterous that they would send him to Africa, to a country where he doesn’t even speak the language, a country with documented human rights violations, when there are so many other options,” he said. “This family has suffered enough.”

However, Mr Sandoval-Moshenberg appeared to suggest that deportation to Costa Rica might be favourable for his client, saying: “That’s a pretty reasonable option, right? I mean, Costa Rica makes sense.

“It’s a Spanish-speaking country. It’s proximate to the United States. His family can visit him there easily.”

Mr Garcia, who lived in Maryland with his American wife and son, was deported to El Salvador under a controversial 18th-century law. He was then imprisoned in its notorious maximum security Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT).

This was despite an immigration judge’s 2019 order granting him protection from deportation after finding he was likely to be persecuted by local gangs if he was returned to his native country.

Democrat senator Chris Van Hollen, who met Mr Garcia in CECOT, said the 29-year-old was “traumatised” by the experience.

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The Trump administration admitted that deporting Mr Garcia was an “administrative error”, but said at the time they could not bring him back as they do not have jurisdiction over El Salvador.

After eventually returning him to the US in June, the Trump administration detained Mr Garcia on criminal charges that were filed in May.

The criminal indictment alleges Mr Garcia worked with at least five co-conspirators to bring immigrants to the US illegally and transport them from the border to other destinations in the country.

Homeland Security secretary Kristi Noem, US President Donald Trump, vice president JD Vance and other officials claim Mr Garcia was a member of MS-13 – an international criminal gang formed by immigrants who had fled El Salvador‘s civil war to protect Salvadoran immigrants from rival gangs.

Mr Garcia’s lawyers strongly deny the claims.

The Menendez brothers, who were sentenced to life for killing their parents in their Beverly Hills mansion in 1989, have both been denied parole.

Lyle Menendez, 56, and his 53-year-old brother Erik have spent 35 years behind bars for the shotgun murders of their father and mother, Jose and Kitty Menendez.

The brothers have claimed that their parents abused them and have argued that the killings were an act of self-defence.

A Netflix drama series about the brothers called Monsters, which aired in September 2024, thrust them back into the spotlight and led to renewed calls for their release, including from their family.

A long-delayed resentencing hearing offered them a path to freedom for the first time since their incarceration.

However, their release from prison is still a long way off – and far from guaranteed.

Parole denied but still possible

Lyle Menendez was denied parole on 22 August after making his first appeal for release. A judge recently reduced both his and his brother’s sentences, making them eligible for parole.

The decision came a day after his brother Erik Menendez was also denied parole by a panel of California commissioners.

A panel of two commissioners recommended that Lyle not be released for three years, after which he will be eligible to apply for parole again.

The panel concluded there were still signs that Menendez would pose a risk to the public if released from custody, despite noting that a psychologist found that he is at “very low” risk for violence upon release.

During the hearing, Menendez cried and took sole responsibility for the murders, saying in his closing remarks: “I will never be able to make up for the harm and grief I caused everyone in my family.”

While speaking to the panel on Friday, Menendez said his father physically abused him by choking, punching and hurting him using a belt.

“I was the special son in my family,” he said. “My brother was the castaway. The physical abuse was focused on me because I was more important to him, I felt.”

He also said his mother sexually abused him, but appeared uncomfortable discussing this when asked by the panel why he did not disclose it during a risk assessment earlier this year.

When asked whether the murders were planned, Menendez said: “There was zero planning. There was no way to know it was going to happen Sunday.”

He also described buying the guns used in the murder as “the biggest mistake”, and told the panel: “I no longer believe that they were going to kill us in that moment. At the time, I had that honest belief.”

What does the resentencing mean?

Before leaving his role in December, former Los Angeles district attorney (DA) George Gascon asked LA County Superior Court Judge Michael Jesic to review the brothers’ convictions.

During the resentencing on 13 May, he gave them a revised sentence of 50 years to life, making them immediately eligible for youth parole under California’s youthful offender law because they committed the crime while under the age of 26.

The judgment was based on whether the pair had been rehabilitated based on their behaviour in prison.

The brothers’ case highlighted some of their achievements behind bars: attaining several degrees and contributing to the community.

It listed a prison “beautification programme” Lyle Menendez started called GreenSpace as one example, and added that both brothers had received low-risk assessment scores, with Lyle apparently not being involved in a single fight during his time in jail.

The brothers’ attorneys pushed for the judge to resentence the brothers to manslaughter, which would have allowed them to be immediately released, but he gave them a revised murder sentence instead.

Handing them the new sentence, Judge Jesic said: “I do believe they’ve done enough in the past 35 years, that they should get that chance.”

The resentencing hearing had faced lengthy delays due to the judge needing to review a large number of files, as well as the LA wildfires in January.

There was also a turnover in the DA’s office, with liberal leaning Gascon replaced by the more conservative Nathan Hochman, who repeatedly attempted to have the resentencing hearing thrown out.

Emotional testimony in court from brothers and family members

The brothers appeared at the proceedings in Los Angeles County Superior Court via video feed from prison in San Diego.

“I killed my mum and dad. I make no excuses and also no justification,” Lyle said in a statement to the court. “The impact of my violent actions on my family… is unfathomable.”

Erik also spoke about taking responsibility for his actions and apologising to his family.

He said: “You did not deserve what I did to you, but you inspire me to do better.”

The brothers chuckled when one of their cousins, Diane Hernandez, told the court that Erik received A+ grades in all of his classes during his most recent semester in college.

Anamaria Baralt, another cousin of the brothers, told the court they had repeatedly expressed remorse for their actions.

“We all, on both sides of the family, believe that 35 years is enough. They are universally forgiven by our family,” she said.

The defence also called a former judge and a former fellow inmate to the witness stand to testify that the brothers were not only rehabilitated, but also helped others. Prosecutors cross-examined the witnesses but didn’t call any of their own.

Former judge Jonathan Colby, who said he considered himself tough on crime, told the court that spending time with the brothers and witnessing their growth made him believe in rehabilitation.

Anerae Brown, who previously served time in prison alongside the brothers, cried as he testified about how they helped him heal and eventually be released through parole.

“I have children now,” he said. “Without Lyle and Erik I might still be sitting in there doing stupid things.”

The judge said he was particularly moved by a letter from a prison official who supported resentencing, something the official had never done for any incarcerated person in his 25-year career.

Los Angeles County prosecutors argued against the resentencing, saying the brothers have not taken complete responsibility for the crime.

The current DA Mr Hochman said he believed the brothers were not ready for resentencing because “they have not come clean” about their crimes.

His office has also said it does not believe they were sexually abused.

“Our position is not ‘no’. It’s not ‘never’. It’s ‘not yet’,” Mr Hochman said. “They have not fully accepted responsibility for all their criminal conduct.”

What happens now?

The reduced sentencing made the brothers immediately eligible for parole, but they must still appear before a state parole board, which decides on whether or not to release them from prison.

While this decision is made, the brothers will remain behind bars.

Their first hearing had to take place no later than six months from their eligibility date, according to board policy.

After their first appeal was denied, the brothers will continue to receive subsequent hearings until they are granted release.

But the brothers have another potential avenue to freedom, having appealed to California governor Gavin Newsom for clemency before they were resentenced.

Mr Newsom has the power to free them himself through clemency, and in February, he ordered the state parole board to investigate whether the brothers would pose a risk to the public.

They already have a hearing before the board scheduled for 13 June, but that one was set as part of the clemency petition.

It’s not yet clear if that hearing will serve as their formal parole hearing or if a separate one will be scheduled.

Mr Newsom can override any decision the board makes.

Anne Bremner, a trial lawyer in Seattle, said the brothers will be preparing for the parole board and aiming to impress upon them that they should be let out, but suggested the board members will already have a clear view.

“My guess is the parole board has been watching this and of course they’ve done these risk assessments already,” she said, adding they will know “who these two are, what their alleged crimes were and what they’ve done since the time that they were incarcerated until today.”

Potential new evidence

The brothers’ lawyers have also submitted a letter Erik wrote to his cousin as new evidence, saying it was not seen by the jury when the brothers were sentenced in 1996 and could have influenced their decision.

The letter is dated months before the murders, which they say alludes to him being abused by his father, Jose Menendez.

In the handwritten letter, Erik wrote: “I’ve been trying to avoid dad… every night, I stay up thinking he might come in.”

He also said he was “afraid” and that he needed to “put it out of my mind” and “stop thinking about it”.

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More new evidence submitted comes from Roy Rossello, a former member of the band Menudo, who alleges he was sexually assaulted by Jose Menendez as a teenager in the 1980s.

He has provided a signed declaration of his alleged rape by Jose Menendez to the brothers’ lawyers, which the lawyers say is further proof of his supposed abusive nature.

LA prosecutors filed a motion opposing the petition, but its status is unclear, and appears to have been halted while the brothers have pursued their resentencing and clemency.

What happened in the original Menendez trials?

On 20 August 1989, Lyle and Erik Menendez shot their parents, Jose and Mary Louise “Kitty” Menendez, multiple times at close range.

The brothers, who were 21 and 18 at the time, initially told police they found them dead when they got home, but were eventually tried for their murder.

During the original trial, prosecutors accused the brothers of killing their parents for a multimillion-dollar inheritance, although their defence team argued they acted out of self-defence after years of sexual abuse by their father.

An initial attempt to try each brother individually in front of separate juries ended in a mistrial after both juries failed to reach a verdict.

In their second trial, which saw the brothers tried together, the defence claimed the brothers committed the murders in self-defence after many years of alleged physical, emotional and sexual abuse at the hands of their father, with no protection from their mother.

They said they had feared for their lives after threatening to expose their father.

The prosecution argued the murders were motivated by greed, and they killed their parents to avoid disinheritance.

Evidence of alleged abuse from their defence case was largely excluded from the joint trial by the judge.

In 1996, seven years after the killings, a jury found the brothers guilty, and they were convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy to murder.

They were sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.

But the brothers and many of their family members have continued to fight for their freedom ever since.

Although their focus of late has shifted towards the brothers’ rehabilitation in prison, their main argument in recent years has been that more evidence of Jose Menendez’s alleged abuse has come out since the last trial, and that a modern jury would have a better understanding of the impact of abuse than one 30 years ago.

The US Justice Department has released a transcript of an interview with Ghislaine Maxwell – the jailed ex-girlfriend of paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein.

Maxwell said in the interview with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche last month that she never saw US President Donald Trump in an “inappropriate setting”.

According to the transcript, Maxwell said: “I never witnessed the president in any inappropriate setting in any way. The president was never inappropriate with anybody.”

Maxwell also recalled knowing about Mr Trump and possibly meeting him for the first time in 1990, when her newspaper magnate father, Robert Maxwell, was the owner of the New York Daily News.

“I may have met Donald Trump at that time, because my father was friendly with him and liked him very much,” Maxwell said, according to the transcript.

Maxwell said her father was fond of Mr Trump’s then-wife, Ivana, “because she was also from Czechoslovakia, where my dad was from.”

She was sentenced in the US in June 2022 to 20 years in prison following her conviction on five counts of sex trafficking for luring young girls to massage rooms for Epstein to abuse. She has asked the US Supreme Court to overturn her conviction.

Epstein, 66, was found dead in his cell at a Manhattan federal jail in August 2019 as he awaited trial on sex trafficking charges. His death was ruled a suicide.

His case has generated endless attention and conspiracy theories due to his and Maxwell’s links to famous people like royals, presidents and billionaires, including Mr Trump. No one other than Epstein and Maxwell has been charged with crimes.

Mr Trump knew Epstein socially in the 1990s and early 2000s. During Maxwell’s trial in 2021, Epstein’s longtime pilot, Lawrence Visoski, said Mr Trump flew on Epstein’s private plane several times. Mr Trump has denied flying on the plane.

Maxwell said in her interview with the Justice Department that she never saw Mr Trump receive a massage.

She told Mr Blanche that Mr Trump “was always very cordial and very kind to me”, adding: “And I just want to say that I admire his extraordinary achievement in becoming the president now.”

The release of the transcript comes after Mr Trump has faced criticism from Republican supporters and Democrats over his Justice Department’s decision not to release further details relating to Epstein, after the now US president promised to do so during the election.

The Justice Department previously said a review of the Epstein case had found “no incriminating ‘client list'” and “no credible evidence” the jailed financier had blackmailed famous men.

In the transcript of the department’s interview with Maxwell, Epstein’s former girlfriend said that she is not aware of any Epstein ‘client list’.

After her interview in July, Maxwell was moved to a minimum-security prison camp in Bryan, Texas, by the federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) after she was held at a low-security prison in Tallahassee, Florida, that housed men and women.

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The Texas camp houses solely female prisoners, the majority of whom are serving time for nonviolent offences and white-collar crimes.

Neither Maxwell’s lawyer nor the BOP gave a reason for the move.

Maxwell’s legal team have maintained that she was wrongly prosecuted and denied a fair trial, and have floated the idea of a pardon from Mr Trump.

The president said earlier this month that “nobody” had asked him about pardoning Maxwell, but insisted that he has “the right to do it”.

Mr Trump said: “I’m allowed to do it, but nobody’s asked me to do it. I know nothing about it. I don’t know anything about the case, but I know I have the right to do it. I have the right to give pardons, I’ve given pardons to people before, but nobody’s even asked me to do it.”

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