Evidence of guilt and innocence that police say arresting the accused killer of health insurance executive Brian Thompson at the scene will make it difficult for his lawyers to defend himself, former prosecutors and other legal experts say.
Luigi Mangione, 26, was arrested in Pennsylvania on Monday after a multi-state manhunt at a McDonalds in downtown Altoona.
New York authorities say fingerprints and shell casings linked him to the crime scene.
His lawyer, Thomas Dickey, earlier told the media that he had “not yet seen the evidence” against his client.
He said Mr. Mangione would plead not guilty to the charges he faces in Pennsylvania, including the gun charges.
In New York, he has been charged with the manslaughter of Mr. Thompson and it is unclear how he will plead guilty to the charge. He is currently being held in a state prison in Pennsylvania as he fights extradition to face that murder charge. The legal dispute over his extradition could take more than a month to resolve, officials said.
But legal experts told the BBC his efforts to challenge his extradition to New York were unlikely to succeed. They could, however, give his defense a glimpse of the state’s evidence against him.
“I don’t know if this is him,” said his lawyer, Mr. Dickey, in a recent interview with the American media, NewsNation, talking about the photos of Mr. Thompson’s killer.
“We will test that water and give the government an opportunity to bring some evidence,” he said.
If he is extradited to New York to face the murder charge, Mitchell Epner, a New York-based lawyer and former prosecutor, told the BBC that, broadly speaking, there were two options Mr Mangione could take if he pleaded not guilty.
“The number one defense is ‘it wasn’t me’ and the number two is ‘it was me, but I shouldn’t be punished’ because of X,” he said.
According to the New York police, Mr. Mangione was found with a gun that looked like a murder weapon, a tool and a fake ID, as well as three handwritten pages believed to reveal his motive.
Mr Epner said the publicly known evidence so far meant denying responsibility was “out the window”.
Another New York-based lawyer, criminal defense attorney and Professor Dmitriy Shakhnevich, said Mr. Mangione’s lawyer could, in theory, argue that his “mental” disability makes him unfit to stand trial.
“If the judge makes a decision that he does not understand or does not understand what is happening in court, in fact the case will not continue,” he said.
“He will be institutionalized for a period of time until he is deemed fit, which is unlikely.”
That defence, Mr Shakhnevich added, is different from an insanity plea, where his lawyers can argue that he is “not responsible for his actions because of some mental disability”.
“That can also be considered a crime, because you will not satisfy the parts of the case,” he said. “But he’s not going to relax again. He’s going to be working for a while, assuming the defense is successful.”
The beginning of Mr. Mangione made anonymous donors receive thousands of dollars to protect themselves through online fundraising.
It comes as some online have shared support for the suspect and anger at the health insurance industry. The New York City Police Department also warned other health care managers could be at risk because of a “hit list” posted online after Mr Thompson’s murder.
In a report, the NYPD said many of the viral posts included the names and salaries of other insurance executives. Also included are wanted signs showing certain bosses in Manhattan.
Mr Mangione is said to have had complaints with the wider industry.
Timothy Gallagher, a former FBI agent and managing director of Nardello and Co, a global investigative firm, said the current climate meant “the copycat threat is real”.
“There are people who have complaints out here and they are looking at the number of stories given to the accused,” he said.
Mr Gallagher said there had been an “outpouring of support from the dark corners of the internet” for anti-corporate causes.
“I’m afraid that that might aggravate the attacks on the fans,” he said.
Source link
