Luigi Mangione, the suspect in the murder of UnitedHealth Group CEO Brian Thompson, walks during his arraignment hearing at New York Supreme Court on December 23, 2024 in New York City, USA.
Eduardo Muñoz | Reuters
Luigi Mangione will not face the death penalty in the New York federal criminal case in which he is accused of killing health insurance CEO Brian Thompson, a judge ruled Friday.
In an order Friday, Manhattan Federal District Court Judge Margaret Garnett dismissed two of the four criminal charges Mr. Mangione was charged with in the case.
The potential maximum sentences for the remaining two counts are: united healthcare Mr. Garnett pointed out that Mr. Thompson’s death in December 2024 on a midtown Manhattan street under federal stalking law was a “life sentence without parole.”
The third count the judge threw out accused Mr. Mangione of using a firearm to kill Mr. Thompson during an act of stalking, “a crime punishable by the death penalty,” the judge wrote. A fourth count, which was also dismissed, accused Mangione of using a firearm equipped with a silencer during the stalking.
“The crimes charged in Counts 3 and 4 require that the stalking offenses in Counts 1 and 2 meet the definition of a ‘crime of violence’ under federal law as a matter of law,” Garnett wrote. “Defendant moves to dismiss Counts 3 and 4 on the basis that this requirement is not met.”
The judge acknowledged that the analysis she applied to that argument “could be torturous and bizarre to the public, and indeed to many lawyers and judges,” and ruled that Supreme Court precedent bound her to the conclusion that the first two counts did not meet the definition of a “crime of violence.”
“Motion approved.”
Separately on Friday, Garnett rejected a defense motion to conceal the contents of Mangione’s backpack when he was questioned and taken into custody by police in Altoona, Pennsylvania, five days after Thompson was killed.
