The case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia captured national headlines last year as part of a wave of criticism against the second Trump administration's aggressive immigration enforcement. It was the speed of his deportation from working in Maryland one week, to getting whisked off to a notorious prison in El Salvador the next. But it was also because it was a mistake: something a government lawyer admitted in court.
The recent federal court order placing Rikers Island in receivership marks an unprecedented intervention to address ongoing violence, mismanagement, and constitutional violations at the facility.