A judge on Wednesday delayed the federal trial of Luigi Mangione, the 27-year-old man accused of fatally shooting UnitedHealthcare chief executive Brian Thompson outside a New York City hotel.
Mangione’s federal trial is now set to begin with jury selection on Oct. 5, followed by opening statements on Oct. 26 or Nov. 2, U.S. District Judge Margaret Garnett said at a hearing in downtown Manhattan.
Jury selection was previously set to start on Sept. 8, with opening statements scheduled for Oct. 13.
Mangione’s lawyers asked Garnett to postpone the federal proceedings until January because he also faces a New York state murder trial that is set to begin on June 8. The defense argued that the overlap would make it difficult for Mangione to prepare for the federal case.
Garnett said the more modest delay of a few weeks would ensure Mangione’s right to a fair trial. She expressed particular concern about the prospect of potential jurors in the federal trial filling out questionnaires while the state case was unfolding in a courthouse just “two blocks away.”
“Whether we like it or not, we are at the will of the state case,” Garnett said, adding that it’s “inevitable” and “it’s the nature of dual prosecutions.”
Mangione has pleaded not guilty in both proceedings. He leaned forward and rested his chin on his right hand as Garnett addressed the courtroom on Wednesday.
Thompson was shot and killed outside the New York Hilton Midtown hotel on the morning of Dec. 4, 2024, as he was on his way to an investors conference. Five days later, amid a frantic manhunt, Mangione was arrested at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania
In the federal case, Mangione faces two counts of stalking, which carry a maximum sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Prosecutors originally charged him with two other offenses — murder through use of a firearm, which carried a potential death sentence, and a related firearms count — but Garnett dismissed those charges in late January.
Garnett ruled that the murder charge can only be used in tandem with a “crime of violence.” She found that Mangione’s alleged stalking of Thompson did not meet that standard, effectively blocking prosecutors from seeking the death penalty.
In the state case, Mangione faces nine felony charges, including second-degree murder and various counts related to criminal possession of a weapon.
New York state prosecutors initially attempted to prosecute Mangione on two other charges — first-degree murder “in furtherance of terrorism” and second-degree murder “as an act of terrorism” — but a judge tossed those counts last year, ruling they were “legally insufficient.”
The state charges carry the possibility of life in prison. (New York does not have the death penalty after its capital punishment statute was declared unconstitutional in 2004.)
Mangione has been detained at the federal Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn since December 2024.
