Luigi Mangione’s state murder trial delayed until September, throwing federal trial into question

By Luc Cohen and Aleksandra Michalska

NEW YORK, April 1 (Reuters) – A New York state judge on Wednesday delayed Luigi Mangione’s trial on charges of murdering a health insurance executive to September 8, throwing into question the timing of a parallel federal trial.

In a brief written order, Justice Gregory Carro in Manhattan pushed Mangione’s trial start date back from June 8. Carro did not specify a reason, but the judge had expressed frustration during a February 6 hearing that federal prosecutors had “reneged” on a promise to let state prosecutors go to trial first. 

Hours earlier, U.S. District Judge Margaret Garnett, who is overseeing Mangione’s federal trial on stalking charges stemming from the shooting death of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, pushed back by a few weeks the start of that trial to October 13.

Mangione’s state court trial is expected to last six weeks, defense lawyer Karen Friedman-Agnifilo said at a hearing before Garnett on Wednesday.

Mangione has pleaded not guilty to all charges. At the February hearing, while being led out of the courtroom in prison garb and shackles, Mangione said it was unfair that he was being exposed to two trials over the same alleged offense.

A spokesperson for the Manhattan district attorney’s office, which brought the state charges, declined to comment. A spokesperson for the Manhattan U.S. Attorney’s office, which brought the federal charges, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

Mangione has been jailed since his arrest in Pennsylvania five days after the shooting death of Thompson, who led UnitedHealth Group’s health insurance business, outside a hotel in midtown Manhattan. 

MANGIONE’S SUPPORTERS CITED BY PROSECUTOR

Mangione’s lawyers had asked Garnett to push the federal trial back to next year from its previously scheduled September start to give them more time to prepare, and said Carro would shift the state trial from June to September if she did so. Garnett’s delay fell short of that request.

At Wednesday’s hearing, federal prosecutor Dominic Gentile pointed to the public support Mangione had garnered as a reason for starting the trial as soon as possible. 

While public officials widely condemned Thompson’s killing, Mangione became a folk hero of sorts to some Americans who decry high costs for U.S. medical care and health insurer practices.

“Your honor need only look out the window to see the people who follow this defendant and believe that what he did was right,” prosecutor Dominic Gentile said.

Roughly a dozen supporters gathered on Wednesday outside the courthouse in lower Manhattan, including one woman wearing a pink shirt depicting Mangione’s face inside a heart shape.

Mangione could face a life sentence if convicted of the federal stalking charges and 25 years to life in prison if found guilty at the state trial. 

(Reporting by Luc Cohen and Aleksandra Michalska in New York; Editing by Nia Wiliams and Bill Berkrot)