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In a court filing Friday night, Luigi Mangione posed what his lawyers say is an urgent question: Why is the federal government seeking the death penalty?
Responding on Monday, federal prosecutors not only opposed tipping their hand, but successfully asked the judge for a month to explain why.
“The government intends to oppose the defendant’s motion and respectfully requests a period of thirty days to file its response,” prosecutors wrote in a tersely-worded letter to the judge, who set an August 27 reply deadline.
Mangione is accused of murder in the December assassination of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. In April, Attorney General Pam Bondi directed New York prosecutors to seek the death penalty.
Mangione’s demand now is for prosecutors to immediately provide details of the so-called aggravating factors they intend to prove in seeking the death penalty at trial.
The government has alleged five aggravating factors, meaning five reasons Thompson’s murder deserves the ultimate punishment.
They include “substantial planning and premeditation,” the “grave risk of death to additional persons,” “victim impact,” “the selection of site for an act of violence,” and “future dangerousness,” according to prosecutors’ bare-bones April 24 “Notice of Intent to Seek the Death Penalty.”
“The allegations in the Notice of Intent filed in this case are generalized and unbounded, leaving the defense blind as to what acts, events, harms — in short, what facts — the government intends to prove,” the defense said in Friday’s filing.
The filing is signed by Avraham Moskowitz, Mangione’s court-appointed death penalty lawyer.
It asks the judge to give prosecutors 90 days — until October 24 — “to provide an informational outline of the essential facts underlying its alleged aggravating factors.”
It will take the defense considerable time to respond, particularly to the prosecution’s claim of “grave risk of death to additional persons,” Moskowitz wrote.
“The Notice does not identify what other people were put in grave risk of death,” he wrote.
“Indeed, given that the shooting of Mr. Thompson was done at close range and early in the morning, when the street was nearly empty, it is hard to imagine, without further specificity, how the government intends to prove this aggravating factor.”
The need for speed is “acute,” Moskowitz added, “since the court has expressed its intention to try this case in 2026.”
US District Judge Margaret M. Garnett quickly granted prosecutors’ request for a 30-day reply deadline.
At a pretrial conference in April, she said she intends to set a firm, 2026 trial date at Mangione’s next scheduled conference, on December 5.
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