The powers that be are still so mad that the American public refuses to hate Luigi Mangione. Some Americans are very much on Team Luigi – either they support him no matter what, or they support him because they think he’s innocent (perhaps even a patsy) of murdering UnitedHealthcare executive Brian Thompson. The Americans who are not on Team Luigi aren’t that mad about him either – they’re not pro-murder, per se, they just think that it’s a weird case and it’s being handled in a weird way. In any case, law enforcement and prosecutors keep trying to convince everyone that Luigi is some kind of evil monster and no one is buying it. They’re even charging him with terrorism. And now the US Attorney General says that the federal government is seeking the death penalty on Luigi. Really??
Attorney General Pam Bondi said on Tuesday that she would seek the death penalty for Luigi Mangione, who was charged with murdering a UnitedHealthcare executive in Manhattan last year, part of a push to revive the widespread use of capital punishment in federal cases.
Ms. Bondi said her decision came after “careful consideration” and was in line with President Trump’s executive order directing the Justice Department to renew death penalty requests after President Biden declared a moratorium on capital punishment for most federal offenders in 2021.
The move, which was widely anticipated, represented the intersection of Mr. Trump’s eagerness to impose the death penalty with a headline-grabbing murder case — the brazen public killing of Brian Thompson, a 50-year-old health care executive targeted because Mr. Mangione saw him as a symbol of callous corporate greed, according to prosecutors.
“Luigi Mangione’s murder of Brian Thompson — an innocent man and father of two young children — was a premeditated, coldblooded assassination that shocked America,” Ms. Bondi said in a statement.
Ms. Bondi directed Matthew Podolsky, the acting U.S. attorney in Manhattan, to seek the death penalty. Nicholas Biase, a spokesman for the office, which has been prosecuting Mr. Mangione’s federal case, declined to comment on Tuesday.
In a statement, one of Mr. Mangione’s defense lawyers, Karen Friedman Agnifilo, said that seeking the death penalty in the case amounted to “premeditated, state-sponsored murder” intended to protect the “immoral” health care industry. The decision “to execute Luigi” ran counter to “historical precedent,” she added.
It is not clear if the Justice Department, under Ms. Bondi, has requested the use of the death penalty since Mr. Trump took office in January, but the request is among the first.
For whatever record, the Attorney General can announce any damn thing she wants, that doesn’t mean it’s actually going to happen. The best way to mitigate Luigi getting a lethal injection is for the prosecution’s case to fall apart at trial and Luigi gets acquitted. I say that because I still think that, regardless if you love or hate Luigi, everything I’ve seen indicates that the case against Luigi is extremely flimsy. It’s very likely that his arrest involved multiple instances of illegal surveillance and planted evidence.
Photos courtesy of Getty, Backgrid.
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- Los Angeles, CA – Luigi Mangione, 26, poses for his latest mugshot after being charged with the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in New York. Mangione has been arrested on suspicion of carrying out the shooting in Pennsylvania. Pictured: Luigi Mangioni BACKGRID USA 10 DECEMBER 2024 BYLINE MUST READ: PA Department of Corrections / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Los Angeles, CA – Luigi Mangione poses for his first arrest photo after being found by cops at a McDonald’s restaurant in Pennsylvania. Mangione, arrested on suspicion of shooting UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson to death in New York, was pictured at Altoona Police Department. Pictured: Luigi Mangione BACKGRID USA 10 DECEMBER 2024 BYLINE MUST READ: Altoona Police Department / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- New York City, NY – Luigi Mangione, 26, accused of assassinating UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, was extradited to New York City under heavy security. He arrived in an NYPD helicopter, wearing a bulletproof vest beneath his prison attire. Pictured: Luigi Mangione BACKGRID USA 19 DECEMBER 2024 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- New York City, NY – Luigi Mangione, 26, accused of assassinating UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, was extradited to New York City under heavy security. He arrived in an NYPD helicopter, wearing a bulletproof vest beneath his prison attire. Pictured: Luigi Mangione BACKGRID USA 19 DECEMBER 2024 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- New York City, NY – Luigi Mangione, 26, accused of assassinating UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, was extradited to New York City under heavy security. He arrived in an NYPD helicopter, wearing a bulletproof vest beneath his prison attire. Pictured: Luigi Mangione BACKGRID USA 19 DECEMBER 2024 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
Luigi’s alleged crime is horrific, but the oligarch magats are making him a folk hero to millions of people, both on the right and left, disenfranchised and impoverished by the crooked behavior of the ultra rich they represent. This is not the flex to keep the masses down the magat oligarchs think it is.
Of course Bondi is seeking the DP, she has to appease her wealthy billionaire overlords. She such a shitty AG and it’s only been 60 something days.
Rich white man gets killed and the feds want to put every bit of their resources behind the case and call for vengence. This surprises no one. This administration will protect only wealthy white men and the occasional woman who knows her place and can be useful to them. That’s it.
Yeah, Bondi ranks right up there with Sarah “Sister Wife” Huckabee Sanders, Sean Spicer and Kayleigh McEnany on level of integrity.
The ruling class would prefer that the peasants fight their fellow peasants, not go after the overlords with pitchforks.
Good luck finding a jury who will not acquit him!
From what I understand, only jurors who are open to the death penalty in the first place may be chosen to sit on the jury. It’s not going to be a jury of his peers.
Maybe, but I bet 98% of regular NYers have been denied coverage by an insurance company. I think Pam and co. will be hard pressed to get that punishment from a jury pool even if they find him guilty.
If only law enforcement had 10% of this energy for stopping and prosecuting all the men who are violent and murderous against women.
Or/and school shooters!
according to republicants, that would be against their religion — after all, women are just property. this is no exaggeration — the vp of this crapshow suggests that women do not have the right to divorce abusive men.
Just think about it a minute, the school shooter who kill children doesn’t get treated like him, no one in an important position asks death penalty for them. When they overcharge him more than they can prove, they are gonna tank their own case.
Agree. That’s how the Florida tot mom got off; she was overcharged.
Most school shooters don’t usually live long enough to get prosecuted.
But those that do not only do not get the death penalty, they are eventually released from prison. Google Mitchell Johnson and Andrew Golden.
The only protected class is the billionaires. I hope he’s acquitted.
I do not advocate violence. However it’s hard to feel any sympathy for the victims and their like. I hope that this is a reality check for the “healthcare” (scam) system is the US.
Hopes he keeps quite and gets acquitted.
How is it okay for the Attorney General to say definitively that he killed that health exec? Shouldn’t he have the legal presumption of innocence?
I don’t think anyone appointed in this administration has any competence in their role and their boss/peers DNGAF.
In a federal case, the AG is considered the prosecution – she is the chief prosecutor. And as the prosecution, she is saying that the case she will make is that Luigi murdered the health exec. The “presumption of innocence” part is that it’s up to her to prove he’s guilty.
Thanks for giving this story more juice, Pam. Just when people had stopped talking about Luigi and the evils of CEO-decided healthcare, she brings it right back into the news. It’s honestly infuriating that we can’t seem to make headway against these idiots.
I guess it depends how solid the rule of law is in the US when his trial comes around.
Two young children?? I thought the guy’s kids were college aged.
You are correct.
They are around high school/college age, but that’s about the only thing they can bring up to evoke sympathy. and even that’s a lie.
AND the whole reason there is a pro-Luigi sentiment is that not a single person in the US genuinely believes that Brian Thompson was “innocent.” That is a man who is directly responsible for thousands of deaths in the name of company profit.
His lawyer is Karen Friedman Agnifilo, an immensely smart and accomplished lawyer and former Chief Assistant District Attorney. She was instrumental in establishing specialized units, including the Human Trafficking Unit, Hate Crimes Unit, Antiquities Trafficking Unit, Cybercrimes and Identity Theft Bureau, and the Terrorism Unit. She also helped develop Manhattan’s first Mental Health Court, focusing on addressing underlying mental health issues in criminal cases. Pam Bondi can bloviate all she wants about giving him the death penalty but she’s up against a formidable legal expert.
Well, I think all death penalties are “premeditated, state-sponsored murder,” not just this particular case. And “murder with a firearm” is a federal crime that can have the death penalty – that’s been around since the gun control laws of the 60’s I think? In any case, Biden issued a moratorium, but not an executive order nor did he try to push it through Congress, so the issue was always going to come back. We’ll see.
It’s funny how tyrants and tyrannical governments throughout history always end up making the very same mistake. As someone upstream mentioned, a white guy murders dozens of our children at a time, he gets apprehended alive with the only real response from our government being “thoughts and prayers” along with an outpouring of sympathy from the press and the pulpit about how everybody needs to show compassion for the shooter because he’s had it so hard in life. Has even one of these white, male school or church shooters been given the death penalty? But shoot one of them and look what happens. They are labeling the murder of ONE PERSON, a man who literally made his wealth intentionally denying millions of people the life-saving medical care they’d paid monthly premiums for, an act of “terrorism?” And they are seeking the death penalty for this one death? These people clearly have never read any of the history books they are trying to ban on what happens next when cruel and unrestrained power kills a folk hero in an attempt to make an example of him. I predict that every day is going to become Take Your Child to Work Day as every CEO starts wearing a toddler as a bullet proof vest.
I suppose they’re trying to make an example out of him so that no one else tries to shoot healthcare CEOs as the death penalty is the deterrent. Let’s face it, these executives are the untouchable aristos. Reminds me of that quote about GM – what’s good for them is good for America. So no one should dare bring down the executive class.
Damn, that’s harsh. But a lesson needs to be taught: DON’T YOU EVER TAKE DOWN THE RICH AND INFLUENTIAL, period. Even if they’ve killed many people by denying them health care to increase the billions insurance companies make from the American people. Health care should never be a profit-making business.
I heard they made an illegal search of Luigi when he was caught and his lawyers are trying to exclude those findings from evidence. It’s a tricky case for sure.
Good luck finding a jury who will convict him of first degree murder.