Jury selection in Luigi Mangione’s Manhattan federal murder case will start in September, a judge ruled Friday — as the accused killer returned to court in a bid to bar prosecutors from seeking the death penalty.
Mangione, 27, sat calmly at the defense table in tan jail duds, his legs in shackles, as Judge Margaret Garnett set a tentative Sept. 8 date to start screening jurors tasked with deciding whether to convict him of the 2024 assassination of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
But before then, the judge will rule on Mangione’s bid to avoid capital punishment.
The University of Pennsylvania grad’s lawyers claim federal officials prejudiced jurors against Mangione by treating him like a villain in a “Marvel movie” — including by parading him in front of news cameras in a “perp walk” where he was flanked by then-Mayor Eric Adams.
If the death penalty charges are tossed, the trial could start as early as Oct. 12 of this year, Garnett said.
But if the death penalty eligible charges stick, chosen jurors will be asked to come back for a trial that will tentatively start in January 2027, the jurist added.
Garnett set the jury selection date at the prodding of Assistant US Attorney Dominic Gentile at the end of nearly three hours of dry legal jousting over whether the murder by firearm rap that has allowed feds to seek capital punishment was legally flawed.
The judge said she would rule in writing at a later date.
Mangione would still face up to life in prison if the judge sides with him, but eliminating the death penalty would be a blow to US Attorney Pam Bondi, who is pushing for what would be the first Manhattan federal execution in more than 70 years.
Several of Mangione’s loyal supporters — who appear to view him as a twisted folk hero despite allegations that he murdered a father of two in cold blood — turned up outside the Lower Manhattan courthouse again for Friday’s hearing.
“I don’t condone murder, but I understand why he did it, you know,” said Tatiana Sulava, 35, an unemployed New Jersey resident who said she used to make Uber Eats deliveries.
“I believe that this will bring awareness to the injustices of the healthcare system.”
Another Mangione courthouse regular, Jonathan Gartreole, insisted that the accused killer’s supporters have been unfairly painted as groupies drawn to the accused killer because of his appearance.
“They’re trying to make the support that people have for Luigi Mangione like a fandom. They’re trying to treat it like some sort of One Direction concert,” he fumed to The Post.
“Everybody was in love with Ted Bundy because he’s beautiful or some crap. They’re trying to turn it into that, but it’s not that,” he said.
“This is about real issues Americans are facing. Calling us a ‘fandom’ is trying to belittle and mitigate the importance of staying out here, but we’re not going to allow that to happen.”
Mangione is accused of assassinating Thompson outside the health insurance company’s investor conference in Midtown on Dec. 4, 2024.
Prosecutors allege the Maryland native mused in his diary about executing the healthcare boss in order to draw attention to what he called a predatory private healthcare industry.
It was not immediately clear Friday how news that Mangione’s federal trial could start as soon as October would impact his separate state case, brought by the Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office.
The judge in that case, Gregory Carro, has said he will rule by May 18 on Mangione’s efforts to throw out key evidence, like the alleged murder weapon and statements he allegedly made to police and jail guards.
But Carro declined to set a trial date after a grueling three-week evidence hearingthat wrapped in December.
Mangione’s lawyers have pushed for the federal case to start first, given the life-and-death stakes.
“I do apologize for any strife of traumas, but it had to be done. Frankly, these parasites simply had it coming,” the accused killer allegedly wrote in his notebook.
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