On Friday, February 27, federal prosecutors said they do not intend to appeal the judge’s ruling that prevents them from seeking the death penalty against Luigi Mangione, the man who has been accused of the fatal shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson outside of a Manhattan Hotel in December 2024.
Deputy U.S. Attorney Sean Buckley wrote in a letter to Judge Margaret Garnett that the government will not request the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to reverse her decision, which paves a straight path to trial that is expected to begin in September 2026. Mangione’s state murder trial is set to begin a few months earlier in June.
Charges Dismissed
Last month, Garnett dismissed a federal charge, murder through the use of a firearm, which allowed prosecutors to seek capital punishment. She ruled as such because she found it legally flawed and to “foreclose the death penalty as an available punishment to be considered by the jury,” when they are responsible for deciding whether to convict Mangione.
In her decision, she acknowledged it “may strike the average person — and indeed many lawyers and judges — as tortured and strange, and the result may seem contrary to our intuitions about the criminal law.” But it reflected her “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.”
Death Penalty Barred
Garnett, a former Manhattan federal prosecutor who was appointed to the bench by President Joe Biden, has been involved in Mangione’s proceedings since the beginning. She is moving forward at an appropriate pace to get this case heard and tried as fairly as possible. In addition to dismissing the federal charge, she also threw out a separate gun charge. However, with the stalking charges still on the table, Mangione could still face the maximum punishment of life in prison.
When prosecutors originally sought the death penalty, also known as capital punishment, they needed to prove that Mangione committed another “crime of violence” when he allegedly murdered Thompson. According to Garnett in her 39-page opinion, stalking does not fit that definition, and she cited case law and precedent to support her claims.
This ruling goes against the Trump administration’s bid to have Mangione executed. When he was first arrested, Attorney General Pam Bondi was quick to offer the death penalty, calling Thompson’s murder a “premeditated, cold-blooded assassination that shocked America.” Mangione’s case marks the first capital case brought by the Justice Department in President Donald Trump’s second term.
Arrest of Luigi Mangione
The well-educated 27-year-old and member of a prominent, wealthy Maryland family, Luigi Mangione, pleaded not guilty to all charges in both the federal and state cases against him. He is facing two life sentences, one from each case. At a recent court hearing, Mangione’s defense team voiced the injustice of back-to-back trials to the judge. “It’s the same trial twice. One plus one is two. Double jeopardy by any commonsense definition.”
Brian Thompson, 50, was walking to Midtown Manhattan to a UnitedHealth Group’s annual investor convention on December 4, 2024, when he was shot from behind. Surveillance footage obtained from the incident shows a masked gunman approaching the CEO from behind and firing three quick shots. Those bullet casings later recovered by police had “delay,” “deny,” and “depose” written on them, which was assumed to mimic a phrase describing how insurers avoid paying out to their clients.
Nearly a week later, police received a call from a McDonald’s worker in Altoona, Pennsylvania, approximately 230 miles west of Manhattan. They arrive and corner Mangione, who was quietly eating his breakfast at a table. When he was arrested and transported back to New York, his lawyers claimed that authorities turned his case into a “Marvel movie” spectacle, initiating prejudice from the start.
Mangione’s federal case is set to begin at the beginning of September, with jury selection scheduled for the first full week of the month, and opening statements and testimony to begin on October 13. As for his state trial, it is expected to begin on June 8, but the presiding Judge Gregory Carro said if prosecutors appeal the death penalty ruling, it could push the case back all the way to September.
