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Luigi Mangione will no longer be subject to the death penalty after a U.S. judge dismissed the murder and weapons charges against him in the case involving the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. This decision marks a significant setback for federal prosecutors.
Judge Margaret Garnett, presiding in Manhattan, cited Supreme Court precedents as the reason for dropping the murder charge. She noted that the charge was legally inconsistent with the two stalking charges Mangione still faces, acknowledging that the ruling might perplex the general public.
Despite the dismissal of the murder charge, Mangione, aged 27, could still face a life sentence without parole if found guilty of the stalking charges.
During a routine court session on Friday, federal prosecutor Dominic Gentile informed Judge Garnett that the government has yet to decide whether it will file an appeal.
Thompson, who was at the helm of UnitedHealth Group’s insurance division, was tragically shot on December 4, 2024, outside the Hilton hotel in midtown Manhattan.
Mangione pleaded not guilty to all charges stemming from Thompson’s death, and has been jailed since his arrest in Pennsylvania five days after the killing.
While public officials widely condemned Thompson’s killing, Mangione became a folk hero of sorts to some who decry high costs for medical care and health insurer practices.
Garnett has scheduled jury selection in the case to begin in September, with the evidence phase of trial beginning 12 October.
Mangione has also pleaded not guilty to separate murder, weapons and forgery charges in a New York state court in Manhattan.
No trial date in that case has been set.
Prosecutors in that case suffered their own setback in September, when the judge dismissed two terrorism-related counts against Mangione.
In a 39-page decision, Garnett said federal prosecutors could pursue their murder and weapons charges only if the stalking charges qualified as “crimes of violence”.
She said the charges did not qualify because any use of force could be achieved through reckless, as opposed to intentional, conduct.
The judge said prosecutors and Mangione agreed that this fell short of the kind of “force” the Supreme Court required to make out a crime of violence.
Garnett acknowledged the “apparent absurdity” of the legal landscape, saying no one would seriously question that Mangione’s alleged conduct — crossing state lines to kill a specific healthcare executive with a handgun equipped with a silencer — was violent criminal conduct.
She said her analysis may strike ordinary people, and many lawyers and judges, as “tortured and strange” but it “represents the court’s committed effort to faithfully apply the dictates of the Supreme Court to the charges in this case. The law must be the court’s only concern”.
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