Luigi Mangione, charged in the 2024 shooting death of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, returned to federal court on Friday (Jan. 9).
The long hearing, which saw Mangione in a tan prison jumpsuit with a blue shirt and a white long-sleeved garment underneath, ended with a tentative trial date set by Judge Margaret M. Garnett. She said that jury selection would begin on September 8 of this year, just after Labor Day. Following that, the trial would begin the following winter, perhaps as late as January, if it is a capital case. If no death penalty is involved, the trial would begin sometime in the fall.
The January start date was pushed for by Mangione's defense team, who said that they had jury consultants and mitigation specialists lined up who would not be available until then. Judge Garnett said she would be issuing a scheduling order with specifics in the coming weeks.
Beyond the date-setting, key to Friday’s hearing was the issue of whether the possibility of the death penalty should remain on the table. Mangione’s legal team has said that it shouldn’t. One of their arguments is that the murder and firearms charges to which the death penalty is attached don't make sense, and should be dismissed.
Mangione's argument was laid out by attorney Paresh Patel, who said that the charges in question required his client's alleged stalking of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson to have been a "crime of violence," and that stalking does not meet that definition because there are ways of stalking someone without putting them “in reasonable fear” of death or serious bodily injury — even if that stalking results in death.
Patel's argument, frequently interrupted with questions by Judge Garnett, relied on a number of hypothetical arguments in which a person engaged in stalking that resulted in the victim dying, without the stalker's intent to cause injury or death.
Assistant US Attorney Jun Xiang offered a rebuttal, calling Patel's hypotheticals "farfetched" and irrelevant to the necessary elements of the charges. He said that the charges were about "intentional, targeted" behavior.
"This is a difficult issue, and one that much of this case turns on," Judge Garnett said after arguments concluded. She noted that she would be issuing a written decision soon.
In addition to the issues around the murder and firearms charges, Friday's hearing also dealt with whether the contents of a journal found in Mangione's backpack when he was arrested in Altoona, Pennsylvania would be admitted as evidence at trial. Mangione's team is pushing for an evidentiary hearing on that issue. Judge Garnett said that "at present," she didn't believe such a hearing would be necessary, but that there was a possibility she would change her mind "upon reflection."
While there were no major decisions made on Friday, Mangione has seen some recent success on the legal front — most notably with the dismissal of terrorism charges from his New York State case. He will return to federal court on January 30.