By SUDHIN THANAWALA and GARY FIELDS, Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — A migrant from Venezuela deported by the Trump administration to El Salvador has taken the first step toward suing the U.S. government, saying he was wrongly sent to a notorious prison in the Central American country where he was beaten by guards and kept from contacting his family or an attorney.
Neiyerver Adrián Leon Rengel, 27, has filed a claim for $1.3 million with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, his attorneys with Democracy Defenders Fund said Thursday. Rengel is among more than 250 migrants from Venezuela sent to El Salvador in March, out of the jurisdiction of U.S. courts, after President Donald Trump invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 against members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua.
Immigration agents took Rengel into custody on March 13 in the parking lot of his apartment in Irving, Texas, wrongly claiming his tattoos reflected an affiliation with Tren de Aragua, according to his claim. He had entered the U.S. in 2023. He worked as a barber and was scheduled to appear before an immigration judge in 2028.
Homeland Security said in an email that Rengel was a “confirmed associate” of the Tren de Aragua gang — though it did not specify how it reached that conclusion — who had entered the country illegally. It called his claims a fake “sob story.”
“President Trump and Secretary Noem will not allow foreign terrorist enemies to operate in our country and endanger Americans,” the email said. It added, “We hear far too much about gang members and criminals’ false sob stories and not enough about their victims.”
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At El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT, Rengel said guards hit him with fists and batons and, on one occasion, viciously beat him after taking him to an area of the prison without cameras.
Rengel was sent to Venezuela earlier this month as part of a prisoner exchange deal. His attorneys say he is living with his mother and is “terrified” to return to the United States.
They are seeking compensation for emotional and psychological injuries.
A federal judge ruled in June that the Trump administration must give some of the migrants sent to the prison in El Salvador a chance to challenge their deportations.
U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg said the people hadn’t been able to formally contest the removals or allegations that they were members of Tren de Aragua. He ordered the administration to work toward giving them a way to file those challenges.
The judge wrote that “significant evidence” had surfaced indicating that many of the migrants were not connected to the gang “and thus were languishing in a foreign prison on flimsy, even frivolous, accusations.”
At a hearing on Thursday, an attorney for the Trump administration told Boasberg it would not immediately bring the migrants sent from El Salvador to Venezuela as part of the prisoner exchange back to the U.S.
Trump officials planned to await the outcome of other court cases before deciding whether to allow the migrants to return, U.S. Department of Justice attorney Tiberius Davis said.
Boasberg had ordered the administration to turn planes carrying the accused gang members around, but the demand was ignored. Rengel’s attorneys say he was on one of those planes.
The judge has found probable cause that the administration committed contempt of court.
Boasberg said Thursday he planned to expand his contempt probe to include a recent whistleblower complaint that claims a top Justice Department official suggested the Trump administration might have to ignore court orders as it prepared to deport Venezuelan migrants it accused of being gang members.
Thanawala reported from Atlanta.
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