BBC Information, Washington DC
US prosecutors will search the demise penalty for Luigi Mangione, the person accused of taking pictures lifeless UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in December.
Legal professional Common Pam Bondi stated in a press release on Tuesday that she had directed federal prosecutors to hunt capital punishment for the “premeditated, cold-blooded assassination”.
Mr Thompson was shot lifeless exterior a lodge in New York on 4 December. Police arrested Mr Mangione, 26, days later in Pennsylvania after a nationwide manhunt.
He has pleaded not responsible to state costs, and has but to enter a plea for separate federal costs. He’s awaiting trial in a New York jail.
Within the press launch, Bondi stated Mr Thompson’s homicide “was an act of political violence” and that it “could have posed grave danger of demise to extra individuals” close by.
Investigators say Mr Mangione was motivated to kill Mr Thompson, 50, due to anger with US medical insurance corporations.
A lawyer for Mr Mangione referred to as the choice “barbaric”, accused the federal government of “defending the damaged, immoral, and murderous healthcare trade”, and stated Mr Mangione was caught in a tug-of-war between state and federal prosecutors.
“Whereas claiming to guard in opposition to homicide, the federal authorities strikes to commit the pre-meditated, state-sponsored homicide of Luigi,” stated Karen Friedman Agnifilo in a press release.
Mr Mangione is going through 11 state felony counts in New York, together with first-degree homicide and homicide as a criminal offense of terrorism.
If convicted of all of the counts, he would face a compulsory sentence of life in jail with out the opportunity of parole.
However federal prosecutors have additionally individually charged Mr Mangione for utilizing a firearm to commit homicide and interstate stalking leading to demise. These costs make him eligible for the demise penalty.
Prosecutors have stated the federal and state instances will transfer ahead parallel with each other.
EPAMr Mangione is being held on the Metropolitan Detention Middle (MDC) Brooklyn.
New York prosecutors have already shared some proof of their case in opposition to him, together with a optimistic match of his fingerprints with these found on the crime scene.
In keeping with New York District Legal professional Alvin Bragg, Mr Mangione arrived in New York Metropolis on 24 November and stayed in a Manhattan hostel utilizing a pretend ID for 10 days earlier than finishing up the assault in opposition to Mr Thompson.
The healthcare boss was shot within the again by a masked assailant on 4 December as he was strolling right into a lodge the place the corporate he led was holding an buyers’ assembly.
A nationwide search led police to Mr Mangione 5 days later at a McDonald’s a whole bunch of miles away in Altoona, Pennsylvania.
Police stated that once they discovered Mr Mangione, he was in possession of a ghost gun – a firearm assembled from untraceable components – a pretend ID, a passport and a handwritten doc indicating “motivation and mindset”.
Mr Thompson’s killing ignited a fraught debate about how the US healthcare system operates.
Some People, who pay extra for healthcare than individuals in another nation, expressed anger over what they see as unfair therapy by insurance coverage companies.
US Homeland Safety Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas stated in December that the rhetoric on social media within the wake of the killing was “terribly alarming”.
“It speaks of what’s actually effervescent right here on this nation, and sadly we see that manifested in violence, the home violent extremism that exists,” he advised CBS’s Face the Nation.
