'Blistering': DOJ witness leveled at bail hearing for wrongfully deported dad
Kilmar Ábrego García was back in a Nashville court on Wednesday as a federal judge reviews a court ruling saying that the U.S. government didn't meet its burden to detain him before trial.
This is unfolding at the same time that another federal judge intends to issue a ruling on whether Ábrego García can be captured by U.S Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and shipped off to a third-party country, such as Sudan, if he were to be released on bail.
The judge in that case, Paula Xinis, said her ruling would be available before Ábrego García's possible bail.
Legal reporter Adam Klasfeld of "All Rise News" noted that if Xinis issues a ruling on the matter immediately before the bail release, it could give the government little to no time to appeal before Ábrego García is released.
Meeting in court, the Justice Department called Homeland Security Investigations Agent Peter Joseph to answer questions about the intentions of ICE for Ábrego García's release.
U.S. District Judge Waverly D. Crenshaw Jr. will preside over the case and opened the hearing by saying that he has reviewed all of the information from U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes, who oversaw the grand jury investigation.
Reporting on the hearing, Lawfare's Anna Bower said that at issue was Jose Hernandez-Reyes, who was in federal custody for his own allegations. While in custody, in April, after Ábrego García was sent to a brutal prison in El Salvador, Hernandez-Reyes named Ábrego García as being involved in a possible smuggling ring.
One informant that the DHS agent brought up claimed Ábrego García acted inappropriately with minor females. The judge asked, "You sat on this interview? It was here in Tennessee?" The DHS agent claimed that the witness was "an informant."
The DHS agent, Joseph, went on to talk about allegations that came from the cooperator's ex-girlfriend, who said she overheard Ábrego García confess to participation in a murder.
The Legal Information Institute defines hearsay as "an out-of-court statement offered to prove the truth of whatever it asserts, which is then offered in evidence to prove the truth of the matter."
With very narrow exceptions, hearsay is not allowed to prove charges in court. However, it's being allowed on Wednesday because it's a hearing about whether Ábrego García should be granted bail.
Ábrego García's lawyer, Sean Haecker, managed to catch the agent in a number of inconsistencies.
At one point, Klasfeld noted that the DHS agent "repeatedly expressed disinterest in whether what Hernandez-Reyes told other HSI agents is inconsistent with what Hernandez-Reyes told him."
Joseph went so far as to say that he never even reviewed previous comments from the cooperating witness to compare inconsistencies. In fact, to this day, he's never read any previous interviews with the cooperating witness.
Klasfeld pointed out that Joseph claimed he was unaware of what Hernandez-Reyes received for his cooperation with the Justice Department. However, he noted that when he interviewed Hernandez-Reyes, it was toward the end of his 30-month sentence. Despite Hernandez-Reyes not finishing his sentence, he was out of prison in a halfway house. Joseph confessed that it was "atypical."
"Hecker's cross-examination of the witness has been blistering," said Klasfeld. " Hecker established that the agent didn't cross-check the cooperator's account with his accounts to other agents. The cooperator, Hernandez-Reyes, initially told the agent that Abrego did not have tattoos linked to MS-13. The agent claims that Hernandez-Reyes added that the question was 'dangerous,' but that detail wasn't in his notes, Hecker established."
Joseph claimed, "I am by no means making it up."
Klasfeld then noted that the allegations that he solicited images from a teen on Snapchat come from an account where the person self-identifies a birthday not belonging to Ábrego. The DHS agent confessed he never knew Ábrego's birthdate.
Anna Bower noted a moment when the judge asked if it was possible that the cooperating witnesses could have coordinated their statements.
"I mean, always possible, they're family," said Joseph. Still, he claimed they did not.