The criminal defense attorneys representing Kilmar Abrego Garcia in his federal human smuggling case last Friday submitted a court filing announcing that, earlier that day, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) moved their client to the Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Philipsburg, Pennsylvania, following their complaints about the difficulty reaching Abrego Garcia at a detention facility in Farmville, Virginia.
Despite being geographically closer to his attorneys at the New York-based law firm, Hecker Fink, the new filing claims that the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in Pennsylvania may be more difficult for the legal team to access than the Virginia detention center.
The filing states that while an ICE official told Abrego Garcia the transfer, “will allow Mr. Abrego-Garcia’s legal team greater access to him,” the consequences of the move were “not yet clear” to the attorneys.
“Travel to Moshannon is far more difficult for the members of the defense team based in Nashville,” the attorneys wrote, apparently referencing Rascoe Dean of the Tennessee-based firm, Sherrard Roe Voigt and Harbison.
They added, “it is not appreciably easier for the New York-based members of the defense team, compared to Farmville.”
Abrego Garcia’s defense attorneys also claimed the Pennsylvania processing center faces accusations of inadequate medical care, food shortages, and assaults, and note that one detainee at the facility died by hanging last month.
ICE reported last month that the decedent, Chaofeng Ge, was a 32-year-old citizen of China, who spent just five days at the facility before staff members discovered him hanging by the neck in a shower room.
According to ICE, Ge was arrested in January for criminal use of a communication facility, unlawful use of a computer, and access device fraud, and later pleaded guilty to accessing a device issued to another who did not authorize use, as well as a conspiracy charge, in July.
The agency said Ge was sentenced to 12 months in prison, but that courts granted ICE’s request to detain him ahead of deportation.
After sharing their concerns about Abrego Garcia’s transfer, the attorneys nonetheless noted the Pennsylvania facility will allow their earlier request for their client to have access to electronic devices while meeting with his lawyers, which they recently said would be necessary for Abrego Garcia to review the 150 hours of jailhouse phone recordings entered into evidence.
“Nonetheless, the government has asserted that Moshannon will allow defense counsel to bring laptops into the facility and accommodate longer legal visits,” the attorneys noted.
Though now in ICE custody after being briefly released by a federal magistrate judge in Tennessee last month, Abrego Garcia was originally returned by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) to Tennessee in June, reversing his March deportation, when U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi unsealed the indictment accusing him of spending nearly a decade embroiled in a human smuggling ring.
The case against Abrego Garcia stems from a November 2022 traffic stop by the Tennessee Highway Patrol (THP), which was first reported by The Tennessee Star. The troopers were revealed by a government document to have suspected human trafficking, but a spokesman for THP told The Tennessee Star that Abrego Garcia was released at the instruction of the “Biden-era FBI.”
Abrego Garcia has pleaded not guilty to the charges. His case is scheduled to reach trial in January 2026.
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Tom Pappert is the lead reporter for The Tennessee Star, and also reports for The Pennsylvania Daily Star and The Arizona Sun Times. Follow Tom on X/Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
