Secretary of State Marco Rubio, President Donald Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi during a Cabinet meeting at the White House. (Samuel Corum/Sipa/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
According to court documents, Abrego Garcia was immediately frog-marched to his cell by prison guards, who kicked him with boots and struck him with wooden batons along the way, leaving visible bumps and bruises across his body.
He and other detainees in the cell slept on metal mattresses, with minimal access to food and satiation. They were also forced to kneel for approximately nine hours, from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m., "with guards striking anyone who fell from exhaustion."
Abrego Garcia’s physical condition deteriorated quickly – within two weeks, his lawyers said, he lost roughly 31 pounds.
He was also psychologically tortured and received threats of violence during his time at CECOT, according to the filing, where prison guards repeatedly told him they would transfer him to other prison cells housing violent gang members, whom they assured him would "tear" him apart.
In fact, the filing said, Abrego Garcia "repeatedly observed prisoners in nearby cells" violently harm one another "with no intervention from guards or personnel."
"Screams from nearby cells would similarly ring out throughout the night without any response from prison guards or personnel," they said.
The filing, in part, appears to undercut administration officials' repeated assertions that Abrego Garcia is a member of the MS-13 gang – noting that prison officials at CECOT "explicitly acknowledged" his tattoos "were not gang-related," and told him, "your tattoos are fine."
Secretary Kristi Noem delivers remarks to staff at DHS headquarters on Jan. 28, 2025. (Manuel Balce Ceneta-Pool/Getty Images)
Lawyers for Abrego Garcia told the judge there in a separate filing Wednesday night that the Trump administration has, for months, made "extensive and inflammatory extrajudicial comments about [Abrego] that are likely to prejudice his right to a fair trial," including "relentlessly" attacking his character and reputation – claiming he is a "gang member, human trafficker, and serial domestic abuser," and referring to him as a criminal on three dozen occasions after his indictment, despite the fact he has not yet had a trial.
They noted that U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes, the judge overseeing the criminal case, previously ordered his release pending trial, citing a lack of evidence and "double hearsay" presented by the government in his June arraignment.
"Thus far, the government’s unabated public disparagement of Mr. Abrego has far outpaced its ability to muster actual evidence, notwithstanding its extraordinary efforts to conjure up such evidence," they said.
The next steps here remain deeply uncertain, given the complexity of the cases, and the dual nature of the civil and criminal cases.
Xinis has previously signaled frustration and impatience with the Trump administration for slow-walking certain requests, or failing to comply with discovery requests from the court.
She chastised Justice Department lawyers on more than one occasion for what she described as their "vague, evasive and incomplete" responses, which she suggested demonstrate "willful and bad faith refusal to comply with discovery obligations."
The two parties will appear in court on Monday at 11 a.m.
Breanne Deppisch is a national politics reporter for Fox News Digital covering the Trump administration, with a focus on the Justice Department, FBI, and other national news.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/abrego-garcia-says-he-endured-beatings-torture-salvadoran-prison-ahead-criminal-trial