"A federal judge on Friday dismissed the two death penalty-eligible counts against Luigi Mangione taking capital punishment off the table for the man accused of shooting and killing UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. Earlier this month, U.S. District Judge Margaret Garnett heard extensive oral arguments as Mangione's attorneys fought to nix the third and fourth charges in the 27-year-old's indictment: murder through use of a firearm and a firearms offense related to carrying a gun equipped with a silencer."
"Garnett cited Supreme Court precedent in her 39-page opinion Friday, agreeing with the defense's legal theory. For one, the element of a stalking offense that the victim experiences a reasonable fear could be satisfied by reckless acts, rather than violent ones, the judge wrote. It doesn't change the calculus if a death occurred. Because the resulting death can be caused accidentally, and certainly negligently or recklessly, the death results' element cannot supply the necessary use of force to convert the charged stalking offenses into crimes of violence,' Garnett wrote."
Luigi Mangione, a 27-year-old Ivy League graduate, is accused of shooting and killing UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson on a Midtown sidewalk. U.S. District Judge Margaret Garnett dismissed the two death-penalty-eligible counts, removing capital punishment as a potential penalty. The remaining federal counts allege interstate stalking and cyberstalking. Mangione's defense argued that stalking offenses are not crimes of violence and therefore cannot support firearm-related murder and silencer charges. Garnett applied Supreme Court precedent, concluding that the stalking element of reasonable fear can be satisfied by reckless conduct and that a resulting death may be accidental or negligent, so it cannot supply the use-of-force element. Garnett also noted stalking can be based on threats of self-harm.
Read at www.amny.com
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]