Luigi Mangione’s lawyers say AG Pam Bondi’s decision to seek the death penalty is ‘highly inconsistent’.
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Luigi Mangione’s lawyers are contesting Attorney General Pam Bondi’s decision to seek the death penalty against him in the New York City killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson tainted by his former job as a lobbyist at the insurance parent company.
Bondi was a partner at Ballard Partners before leading the Justice Department’s charge of changing Mangione’s prosecution to murder, which created a “serious conflict of interest” that violated his due process rights, his lawyers wrote in court Friday. They want prosecutors barred from seeking the death penalty and other charges dropped.
A hearing is scheduled for Jan. 9.
Former Manhattan prosecutor Matthew Gulluzzo says Luigi Mangione’s charges are ‘unusual’ as the suspect in the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson is already facing federal charges. Gulluzzo explains that a federal case could lead to the death penalty, but it could be a year-long process.
By getting involved in the death penalty decision and making public statements suggesting Mangione deserved to be executed, Bondi violated a vow he made before taking office in February to abide by rules of conduct and recuse himself from matters involving Ballard’s clients for a year, Mangione’s lawyers said.
They argue that Bondi continued to benefit from his work for Ballard — and, indirectly, from his work for UnitedHealth Group — through a corporate profit-sharing arrangement and a defined contribution plan that governs.
The “personality” empowered to seek Mangione’s death is “financially involved in the case he is prosecuting,” his lawyers wrote. His conflict of interest “should have made him recuse himself from making decisions on this case,” he added.
Messages seeking comment were left for the Department of Justice and Ballard Partners.
Bondi announced in April that he was directing federal prosecutors in Manhattan to seek the death penalty, announcing even before Mangione was formally charged that the death penalty was appropriate for “premeditated and cold-blooded murder.”
Thompson, 50, was killed on December 4, 2024, while on his way to a Manhattan hotel for UnitedHealth Group’s annual investor conference. Surveillance video shows a masked gunman shooting him in the back.
Mangione, 27, was arrested five days later. He has pleaded not guilty to federal and state murder charges, and the federal charges carry a life sentence. No test is scheduled.
Friday’s presentation brought focus back to Mangione’s case a day after a marathon trial ended his fight to prevent prosecutors in his state case from using some evidence obtained while in custody, such as the gun police say was the same as the one used to kill Thompson. A decision is not expected until May.
Mangione’s defense team tapped into Bondi’s previous lobbying work as it sought to convince US District Judge Margaret Garnett to impose the death penalty, dismiss other charges and release similar evidence sought to be suppressed in the federal case.
In a September court filing, Mangione’s attorneys argued that Bondi’s announcement that he was directing prosecutors to seek the death penalty — which he followed up with Instagram posts and television appearances — showed that the decision was “based on politics, not expediency.” They also said his comments tainted the grand jury system that led to his indictment a few weeks later.
Bondi’s statements and other official actions — including a well-organized tour that saw Mangione lead a Manhattan neighborhood with armed police, and the Trump administration’s undermining of established death penalty procedures — “violated the constitutional and constitutional rights of Mr.
In a statement filed in court last month, federal prosecutors argued that “pretrial publicity, however intense, is not constitutional error.”
Rather than dismissing the case outright or barring the government from seeking the death penalty, prosecutors argued, defense concerns could be better assuaged by carefully questioning prospective jurors about their knowledge of the case and ensuring that Mangione’s rights are respected at trial.
“What the defendant described as a constitutional challenge is simply a rehashing of arguments” rejected in previous cases, prosecutors said. “No one authorizes the waiver or the phasing out of a sentence authorized by Congress.”
Mangione’s attorneys said they want to investigate Bondi’s relationship with Ballard and the company’s relationship with UnitedHealth Group, and will request a variety of documents, including details of Bondi’s compensation at the company, any instructions he gave to Justice Department officials about the case or UnitedHealthcare and sworn testimony from “everyone with knowledge of the company.”
