Luigi Mangione asks federal judge in NYC to toss murder, firearms charges
Luigi Mangione, the man accused of murdering a health care executive in a brazen attack on a Midtown street, is asking a judge to dismiss the most serious charges in his four-count federal indictment and to suppress evidence found in his backpack.
An attorney for Mangione submitted a motion to dismiss the murder and firearms charges in Manhattan federal court early Saturday morning, which — if successful — would eliminate the possibility of Mangione facing the death penalty.
The attorney, Karen Friedman Agnifilo, also argues prosecutors shouldn’t be able to use evidence collected from Mangione’s backpack, which
Lawyers are also looking to suppress Mangione’s initial comments to police at the fast-food restaurant.
“Because the government cannot establish that the searches at the McDonald’s or later at the precinct were valid inventory searches pursuant to established or standardized procedures, the evidence illegally recovered from Mr. Mangione’s backpack must be suppressed,” Agnifilo wrote in a 48-page memo.
Prosecutors allege
Five days later, police in Altoona arrested Mangione after another McDonald’s customer recognized him as the person she’d seen in images released by the NYPD, and called authorities. The officers who arrested Mangione found a 9 mm handgun, ammunition and a handwritten manifesto that was critical of health care companies in the United States, prosecutors say.
Mangione was charged in Thompson’s killing in state court in Manhattan, as well as by federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York. In April, U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi directed federal prosecutors to seek the death penalty in the case and called Thompson’s killing a “cold-blooded assassination that shocked America.”
In the court papers filed Saturday, Agnifilo made a complex legal argument that Mangione’s high-level murder and firearms charges should be dismissed. The two charges — murder committed by the use of a firearm during a crime of violence, and a related firearms charge — require that Mangione committed a separate, underlying violent crime. Federal prosecutors argue that underlying crime is stalking, of which Mangione is facing two counts, while Agnifilo argues that doesn’t fit the bill.
In September, judges in both his cases ruled that state and federal prosecutors had made missteps.
In the federal case, Mangione’s attorneys accused Department of Justice officials of violating his right to a fair trial by sharing opinions that he was guilty on social media.
U.S. District Court
The judge presiding over Mangione’s state court case also
In his order, Judge Gregory Carro rejected the notion by prosecutors that Mangione killed Thompson because he wanted to somehow coerce U.S. citizens.
“While there is no doubt that the crime at issue here is not ordinary ‘street crime,’ it does not follow that all non-street crimes were meant to be included within the reach of the terrorism statute,” Carro wrote in the decision.
Since his arrest, scores of people from across the country and around the world have voiced their support for Mangione. At his court appearances, supporters often show up by the dozens, attend the hearings and protest on the sidewalks of Lower Manhattan. His supporters include people concerned with income inequality, the cost of health care, as well as critics of the death penalty and people who question whether he actually killed Thompson.
Mangione’s attorneys previously filed a motion seeking to toss the possibility of the death penalty, making a variety of constitutional and legal arguments. The judge has not yet ruled on the motion.
Prosecutors will get their chance to respond to Mangione’s latest motion in the coming weeks.
