Suspected shooter Luigi Mangione is led from the Blair County Courthouse after an extradition listening to December 10, 2024 in Hollidaysburg, Pennsylvania.
Jeff Swensen | Getty Images
Federal prosecutors are trying into whether or not to cost Luigi Mangione, the suspect within the killing of United Healthcare’s CEO, two sources aware of the matter instructed NBC News on Wednesday.
If federal prices are filed, the New York state murder case in opposition to Mangione would have precedence, the sources mentioned.
Mangione, 26, was indicted Tuesday on first-degree homicide and different prices within the focused killing of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson, who authorities mentioned was shot from behind as he walked on a Manhattan sidewalk on Dec. 4.
New York police mentioned Mangione focused Thompson, possibly because of the dimensions of the personal medical insurance firm he led. United Healthcare is the biggest personal well being insurer within the United States.
Mangione was indicted on a cost of first-degree homicide in furtherance of terrorism, along with counts of second-degree homicide and other counts.
In New York, a first-degree murder charge wants a particular circumstance past intent, just like the killing of a witness, being a homicide for rent, the killing of a police officer or the killing of somebody in furtherance of terrorism.
Karen Friedman Agnifilo, one of many attorneys representing Mangione on the New York prices, mentioned Wednesday evening that they “are able to combat these prices in no matter court docket they’re introduced.”
“The federal authorities’s reported choice to pile on prime of an already overcharged first-degree homicide and state terror case is very uncommon and raises critical constitutional and statutory double jeopardy considerations,” she mentioned.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg mentioned Tuesday that the ambush killing of Thompson was “meant to trigger shock and a focus and intimidation.”
Mangione, carrying a hooded jacket and a masks, waited for practically an hour close to a resort for Thompson to reach after which shot him from behind with a 9 mm handgun outfitted with a suppressor at round 6:45 a.m., Bragg mentioned.
Mangione was arrested in Altoona, Pennsylvania, on Dec. 9 after he was acknowledged from safety photographs New York police and the FBI distributed.
He is being held in Pennsylvania and has contested extradition to New York. A listening to is scheduled for Thursday.
A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York, the federal prosecutor’s workplace in Manhattan, declined to remark.
Representatives of the FBI and the New York Police Department additionally declined to remark.
If he’s convicted of both first-degree homicide or second-degree homicide as an act of terrorism, Mangione might withstand life in jail with out parole, Bragg mentioned. If he’s convicted of a standard cost of second-degree homicide, the utmost sentence is 25 years to life, Bragg mentioned.
