New York Prosecutors in Luigi Mangione Case Ask Judge for July 1 Trial Date, Setting Up Collision With Separate Federal, Death Penalty Case

The Manhattan District Attorney’s office asked the judge, presiding over the State of New York’s case against Luigi Mangione, the young man accused of gunning down the CEO of United Healthcare, Brian Thompson, to set a trial for July 1. But defense attorneys say they need more time to prepare for the separate, federal trial, where the government is seeking the death penalty. “We are writing to request that the Court set a trial for July 1,” an assistant district attorney, Joel Seidemann, wrote in a letter to Justice Gregory Carro of Manhattan’s State Supreme Court, which was published on Wednesday. “Federal law supports our request that we proceed first, and our right to a speedy resolution of this case would be severely compromised should the federal trial proceed first,” he added. The letter comes a week after a district judge Margaret Garnett set two possible trial dates for Mr. Mangione’s federal trial, as the Sun reported. One for October, if Judge Garnett rules to drop the death penalty eligible charges and one for January, if she decides to keep capital punishment on the table. In either scenario, jury selection is scheduled for September 8, two months after New York state wants its trial to begin. Mr. Mangione, 27, is being prosecuted in three separate jurisdictions for the murder of Thompson: In Pennsylvania, where he was arrested five days after the killing; in New York, where the murder took place; and in the Southern District of New York, where federal prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.Federal prosecutors rarely get involved in state murder cases, but Thompson’s killing is a high profile case and an opportunity for publicity. UnitedHealthcare is the insurance provider for UnitedHealth Group, the largest health insurer in America. Some legal analysts have speculated that the government decided to involve itself because it wanted to seek capital punishment for the killer, since New York State abolished the death penalty in 2004 when its highest court found the state’s sentencing statute unconstitutional. Defense attorneys filed a motion in the federal case, arguing that the death penalty eligible charge, “murder through the use of a firearm,” should be dismissed due to a legal technicality, as the Sun reported in detail. Judge Garnett, who heard oral arguments on the matter on January 9, could rule on the motion as soon as this Friday, when another pretrial hearing is scheduled for Mr. Mangione at federal court. But the state prosecutor wrote in Wednesday’s letter that the state trial should take place before the federal trial, because the “State’s interests would be unfairly prejudiced by any unnecessary delay of this important matter until after defendant’s federal trial.” “On December 4, 2024, Brian Thompson, a fifty-year-old father, was brutally executed by being shot in the back as he was walking to the Hilton Hotel to attend a conference,” the letter states. “This heinous crime happened in Midtown Manhattan, one of the busiest commercial areas in the Country and spread fear and shock throughout Manhattan. New York state unquestionably has a deep interest in upholding the fundamental right to life, maintaining public order, and delivering justice for a murder committed in its jurisdiction. Indeed, almost all murders are prosecuted in this state by local prosecutors,” Mr. Seidemann argued. Furthermore, Mr. Seidemann wrote that local law enforcement, such as detectives from the New York Police Department “worked around the clock to find Mr. Thompson’s killer.” Mr. Mangione was arrested after a nationwide manhunt, five days after the shooting at a local McDonald’s in the heart of Altoona, Pennsylvania, after a customer alerted the manager of the fast-food restaurant that a man with bushy eyebrows, wearing a beanie hat and a surgical mask, eating his breakfast in a back corner of the dining area, resembled the suspect wanted for Thompson’s killing.In his letter, the state prosecutor wrote that this arrest was “based on photos disseminated by the NYPD from surveillance local law enforcement had collected.” Such images included photographs taken in a taxi cab of a young man, wearing a mask, but showing his distinctive eyebrows and piercing eyes. Another low resolution image, also revealing the eyebrows, shows a young man inside an Upper Manhattan youth hostel, where he checked in using a New Jersey driver’s license under the name Mark Rosario. In this image, the man had removed his mask and was smiling with a notably toothy grin. When Mr. Mangione was first confronted by Altoona patrolmen at the McDonald’s, he handed them a driver’s license under the name of Mark Rosario, which turned out to be fake. “Specialized NYPD units actively participated in the investigation, including ballistic analysis, latent print analysis and the crime scene unit. The District Attorney’s office drafted countless court processes to acquire necessary evidence, each item collected on behalf of a New York County Grand Jury and often authorized by a New York State judge,” Mr. Seidemann went on. The prosecutor argued that nineteen witnesses testified before the state grand jury, that indicted Mr. Mangione on December 17, 2024, one day before “a federal writ was presented to the NYPD to produce defendant into federal custody.” After his arrest and arraignment on December 9 at Hollidaysburg, Pennsylvania’s Blair County Courthouse – where Mr. Mangione pleaded not guilty to forgery and firearms charges – the defendant was taken to State Correctional Institution Huntingdon, a maximum-security correctional facility. A corrections officer, Tomas Rivers, who works at SCI Huntingdon and was assigned to watch Mr. Mangione for several days, testified during recent suppression hearings held at Manhattan criminal court that the correctional facility did not want an “Epstein style situation,” meaning they did not want Mr. Mangione to die in his cell. Ten days after his arrest, on December 19, after waiving his extradition rights, Mr. Mangione was dramatically extradited to New York via plane to Long Island and then via helicopter to Manhattan’s Wall Street heliport, where he was met by New York’s then-Mayor Eric Adams and New York Police Department commissioner Jessica Tisch, and dozens of armed officers. A former Manhattan prosecutor, Jeremy Saland, told CNN that “It was almost Hannibal Lecter-esque,” recalling the fictional serial killer being brought to Memphis with a giant entourage of excited law enforcement officials. Mr. Mangion, surrounded by a phalanx of police officers, was subjected to a sensational ‘per walk’ from the helicopter to a black van which headed toward the hulking courthouses of Lower Manhattan. But it was unclear to the media until moments before his court appearance, whether Mr. Mangione would first be taken to Manhattan criminal court, where a grand jury indictment was waiting for him, or to federal court, where federal prosecutors had a criminal complaint, but no indictment yet. Ultimately, Mr. Mangione was first taken to Daniel Patrick Moynihan Courthouse, a federal building , where he was informed of the charges listed in the criminal complaint, but not arraigned. He was then transported to the notorious Metropolitan Detention Center, Brooklyn, where he has been held for over a year. On December 23, 2024, Mr. Mangione was arraigned in state court, where he pleaded not guilty to murder and terrorism charges, as the Sun reported. The terrorism charges were later thrown out by Judge Carro. Four months later, on April 18, the defendant pleaded not guilty to stalking charges and murder through the use of a firearm in federal court, as the Sun also reported. A conviction on these federal charges could lead to the death penalty.On April 30, the defense filed a motion asking the Judge Carro to dismiss the state indictment, or at least pause the proceedings, because the two concurrent indictments, in federal and state court, violated the DoubleJeopardy Clause, which prohibits the prosecution for two offenses based upon the same criminal act. The defense also raised the concern that Mr. Mangione’s life was on the line in federal court, and if a jury in the state case would hear testimony and find the defendant guilty, a jury in the federal case may be prejudiced by that testimony and to do the same. On September 16, Judge Carro issued a ruling, in which he dismissed the terrorism charges, but rejected the double jeopardy violation. He cited a Supreme Court ruling that held “a crime ‘against two sovereigns constitutes two offenses because each sovereign has an interest to vindicate.’”In his decision, the judge mentioned that “federal and state authorities have agreed that the state case should proceed to trial first.” He wrote that he was “not persuaded that proceeding to trial in the state case first will cause the defendant severe prejudice, and the defendant’s claim that any state trial testimony will prejudice his federal trial is merely speculative.” Notably, he said that the federal case will take “several years” before trial. But it seems that Judge Garnett is not planning on waiting several years to try this case in her courtroom. She set the date for jury selection after the Labor Day weekend. The defense team reacted surprised to Wednesday’s letter. The lead attorney, Karen Friedman Agnifilo, released a statement, saying, “This is the first that the defense is hearing about this request. The federal government already has a firm trial date set in September. As a practical matter, Mr. Mangione’s defense team will require the remainder of the year to prepare for that trial. We will respond to the Court about this unrealistic request in the coming days.”However, the state prosecutor argued that the state case is ready for trial.“The People reiterate our readiness to proceed to trial in this matter,” Mr. Seidemann wrote, adding that “The only outstanding issues before this Court are (1) a ruling on the defendant’s suppression motions, and (2) defense’s compliance with our discovery demands. Both issues can be resolved well before July 1, 2026.” In December 2025, the state court held a nine day suppression hearing to determine whether evidence collected during Mr. Mangione’s arrest should be permitted at trial. The defense has argued that because Mr. Mangione’s backpack was searched without a warrant, all items found in that backpack, such as a 3-D printed handgun, a loaded magazine, and a notebook containing disparaging writing against the health insurance industry, should be excluded from the trial. Prosecutors called numerous witnesses, many of them officers from the Altoona police department, who were directly involved in the arrest, and who testified that they followed proper protocol when going through the backpack, citing safety concerns. The judge has said he would rule on the matter by May 18. The next hearing for Mr. Mangione is scheduled for Friday, January 30, at federal court, when the Judge Garnett is expected to rule on several motions, including allowing or dismissing the death penalty eligible charges.

New York Prosecutors in Luigi Mangione Case Ask Judge for July 1 Trial Date, Setting Up Collision With Separate Federal, Death Penalty Case

More from the New York Sun

Santa Monica Establishes $3.5 Million Reparations Fund Despite ‘Dire’ Financial Outlook

Bill Aimed at Avoiding Government Shutdown Stalls in Senate as Democrats Twist Arms on Homeland Security Funding

Britain’s Starmer, China’s Xi Talk up ‘Strategic Partnership’ in First UK-China Summit in Eight Years

More from the New York Sun

Santa Monica Establishes $3.5 Million Reparations Fund Despite ‘Dire’ Financial Outlook

Bill Aimed at Avoiding Government Shutdown Stalls in Senate as Democrats Twist Arms on Homeland Security Funding

Britain’s Starmer, China’s Xi Talk up ‘Strategic Partnership’ in First UK-China Summit in Eight Years

Steven M. Gillon’s New Bio Shows How WWII Shaped the Worldview of Seven Presidents

Education Department Says California’s Efforts To Hide Students’ ‘Gender Transitions’ From Parents Violate Federal Laws

Documentary ‘Natchez’ Probes Hard Truths Behind the Idealized South Presented to Tourists

Trump Border Tsar Says That, With State Cooperation, Surge by ICE in Minnesota Could Wind Down

Putin’s Winter War Kills a Survivor of the Nazi Holocaust