Luigi Mangione pleaded not guilty on Friday to four federal charges that accuse him of stalking and murdering UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in December.
The 26-year-old defendant made his not-guilty plea in Manhattan federal court, forcing the need for a trial. U.S. District Judge Margaret Garnett set the next hearing date for December 5, at which time she will decide on a start date for the federal trial. If convicted, the alleged assassin would be facing a death sentence.
The plea comes a week after a federal grand jury indicted Mangione on four charges: two counts of stalking, one count of murder through use of a firearm, and a firearms offense for the allegation that he used a silencer.
Mangione was accused of fatally shooting Thompson point-blank outside a Manhattan hotel on December 4 before fleeing the city to central Pennsylvania, where he was apprehended by local authorities after an individual alerted the police at a local McDonald’s restaurant. The nationwide manhunt lasted five days. Mangione is currently being held at a federal detention center in Brooklyn.
In addition to the federal indictment, the criminal defendant faces charges in New York and Pennsylvania. He previously pleaded not guilty to the murder and terrorism charges in New York. In Pennsylvania, he faces charges for illegal gun possession.
Federal prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for Mangione after U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi directed them to do so earlier this month. The federal charges for using a firearm to commit murder and for interstate stalking make him eligible for capital punishment if convicted.
“Mangione presents a future danger because he expressed intent to target an entire industry, and rally political and social opposition to that industry, by engaging in an act of lethal violence,” a notice filed by prosecutors on Thursday states. “And he took steps to evade law enforcement, flee New York City immediately after the murder, and cross state lines while armed with a privately manufactured firearm and silencer.”
The Department of Justice has called Mangione’s crime an “act of political violence” that “may have posed grave risk of death to additional persons.” The defense opposes the intended use of capital punishment against their client, accusing the Trump administration of trying to kill Mangione as a “political stunt.”
Mangione allegedly committed the murder because he harbored resentment toward the health insurance industry, possibly exacerbated by his debilitating back injury. Authorities have not fully determined his motive, though his manifesto suggests the political motivation stemmed from his hatred of “parasitic” healthcare companies.
The words “deny,” “defend,” and “depose” were found on shell casings of the bullets used to kill Thompson at the crime scene — a common phrase used by critics of the healthcare industry.
The man has unusually amassed a number of followers, who likewise hate the healthcare industry. His supporters have described Mangione as a “political prisoner” and even contributed to his own legal defense fund.
Taylor Lorenz, an independent journalist, recently defended the supporters of Mangione, whom she described in a CNN interview as a “morally good man.”