A federal judge has blocked the Trump administration, including U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, from detaining accused MS-13 gang member Kilmar Abrego Garcia upon his release from criminal custody in Tennessee.

       Abrego Garcia has been awaiting his release on bail after pleading not guilty last month to human smuggling charges in Tennessee.

       U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis ruled on Wednesday that the U.S. government "shall restore Abrego Garcia to his ICE Order of Supervision out of the Baltimore Field Office."

       Judge Xinis said her order to have Abrego Garcia placed under ICE supervision in Maryland, where he was living with his wife and children before he was mistakenly deported in March, is necessary to "provide the kind of effective relief to which a wrongfully removed alien is entitled upon return."

       The federal judge said her order, which also requires the government to provide 72 hours' notice if it intends to deport him to a third country, is "narrowly tailored" to allow the Trump administration to initiate "lawful immigration proceedings upon Abrego Garcia's return to Maryland."

       The immigration proceedings may or may not include "lawful arrest, detention and eventual removal," Xinis said.

       This decision follows a separate ruling in Abrego Garcia's criminal case where U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw denied the government's motion to revoke a magistrate judge's order for Abrego Garcia's release. Judge Crenshaw said on Wednesday that Abrego Garcia "shall be released upon the issuance of the Magistrate Judge's release order with conditions."

       Judge Crenshaw said he was not persuaded that "Abrego's unlawful removal from the United States now presents a risk that he will fail to appear in court to avoid similar treatment in the future."

       In his memo, Judge Crenshaw said that testimony provided by Peter Joseph, a Homeland Security agent, that Abrego Garcia transported both Barrio 18 and MS-13 gang members cuts against "the already slim evidence demonstrating Abrego is a member of MS-13."

       "For the Court to find that Abrego is member of or in affiliation with MS13, it would have to make so many inferences from the Government's proffered evidence in its favor that such conclusion would border on fanciful," Judge Crenshaw wrote.

       Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran native, was deported in March to El Salvador's CECOT mega-prison -- despite a 2019 court order barring his deportation to that country due to fear of persecution -- after the Trump administration claimed he was a member of the criminal gang MS-13, which he denies.

       He was brought back to the U.S. last month to face charges in Tennessee of allegedly transporting undocumented migrants within the U.S. while he was living in Maryland.

       The government has indicated it intends to detain Abrego Garcia and deport him to a third country if he is released from custody.