NEW YORK (AP) — Manhattan prosecutors urged a judge on Wednesday to set a July trial date in Luigi Mangione ’s state murder case in the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, two months before jury selection in his federal death penalty case.
In a letter, Assistant District Attorney Joel Seidemann asked Judge Gregory Carro to begin the New York trial on July 1, arguing that the state's interests “would be unfairly prejudiced by an unnecessary delay” until after the federal trial.
The state trial hasn't been scheduled and the next hearing isn't until May, when Carro is expected to rule on a defense request to exclude certain evidence that prosecutors say connects Mangione to the killing.
The Manhattan district attorney’s office raised the scheduling issue days after U.S. District Judge Margaret Garnett scheduled jury selection in the federal case for Sept. 8, with the rest of the trial happening in October or January, depending on whether she allows prosecutors to seek the death penalty.
If the death penalty is still in play, the second phase of the federal trial — including opening statements and testimony — will begin Jan. 11, 2027, Garnett said in court last Friday. If it’s not, it will start Oct. 13.
Mangione’s lawyer, Karen Friedman Agnifilo, called the district attorney's request for a July state trial “unrealistic.” The defense will need the rest of the year to prepare for the federal trial, she said.
Federal prosecutors declined to comment.
In his letter to Carro, Seidemann argued that state prosecutors were involved in the investigation from the start while federal prosecutors joined the case about two weeks after Thompson’s death, jumping in to charge Mangione a day after he was indicted in state court.
“It is entirely natural then that the state case would proceed to trial prior to the federal case,” the prosecutor wrote, citing legal precedent. The state, he said, “has an overriding interest in trying this defendant for the cold-blooded execution of Brian Thompson.”
At the time of Mangione’s arrest, Manhattan’s top federal prosecutor said he anticipated the state case would go to trial first.
It isn't just a matter of scheduling. Under New York law, the district attorney’s office could be barred from trying Mangione on state murder charges if his federal trial happens first. The state’s double jeopardy protections kick in if a jury has been sworn in a prior prosecution, such as a federal case, or if that prosecution ends in a guilty plea.
Mangione is due back in court on Friday in the federal case, with Garnett set to rule soon on issues including whether it remains a capital case and whether prosecutors can show jurors some of the evidence debated in the state case.
Those items include a 9 mm handgun that prosecutors say matches the one used to kill Thompson and a notebook in which they say he described his intent to “wack” a health insurance executive.
Mangione has pleaded not guilty to federal and state murder charges; the state charges carry the possibility of life in prison. He is due back in court for a conference in the federal case on Friday.
In his letter, Seidemann told Carro that the district attorney’s office is ready for trial. Any outstanding pretrial issues can be resolved before July, he said.
After holding a three-week hearing in December on the defense’s evidence request, Carro said he wouldn't rule until May 18, “but that could change.”
Thompson, 50, was killed on Dec. 4, 2024, as he walked to a midtown Manhattan hotel for UnitedHealth Group’s annual investor conference. Surveillance video showed a masked gunman shooting him from behind. Police say “delay,” “deny” and “depose” were written on the ammunition, mimicking a phrase used to describe how insurers avoid paying claims.
Mangione, a 27-year-old Ivy League graduate from a wealthy Maryland family, was arrested five days later at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania, about 230 miles (about 370 kilometers) west of Manhattan.
In September, Carro threw out state terrorism charges but kept the rest of the case, including an intentional murder charge.
In the federal case, Mangione’s lawyers want prosecutors barred from seeking the death penalty, arguing that authorities prejudiced him by turning his arrest into a spectacle and by publicly declaring their desire to see him executed.
As for the evidence, Mangione’s lawyers contend Altoona police illegally searched his backpack because they had not yet obtained a warrant. Prosecutors say the search was legal. Officers were following protocols, which require promptly searching a suspect's property for dangerous items, and later obtained a warrant, prosecutors said.
FILE - Luigi Mangione appears in Manhattan Criminal Court for an evidence hearing, Dec. 18, 2025, in New York. (Shannon Stapleton/Pool Photo via AP, File)
WENDOVER, Utah (AP) — The first — and only — person to break the sound barrier in a car hits the track in Utah this week with new wheels and his eye on another record.
Twenty years ago, British driver Andy Green set the land speed record for a diesel-powered car, reaching 350.092 mph (563.4 kph) at Utah’s famous Bonneville Salt Flats. Green will return to the lunarlike landscape Tuesday and try to beat that mark, this time with a hydrogen-powered car.
The retired Royal Air Force fighter pilot aims not only to win another accolade but to showcase the power of hydrogen as a clean-energy alternative. It's the “fuel of the future,” Green told The Associated Press in a July interview.
Green will be driving the 32-foot (9.75-meter) JCB Hydromax, the brainchild of British construction equipment manufacturer JCB. The car is bright yellow, long and slim, resembling a pencil. It's powered by two hydrogen internal combustion engines with a combined 1,600 horsepower, which were adapted from engines used in the company’s construction machinery. They mix pressurized hydrogen gas with air and ignite it to create bursts of power.
In targeting the diesel-powered record, Green also hopes to easily clear the world land speed records for hydrogen internal combustion engines (185.5 mph/298.5 kph) and electric vehicles (341.3 mph/549.2 kph).
Green hit a new top speed of 368.347 mph (592.797 kph) in practice last week, but to officially earn the hydrogen record, he’ll have to do it Tuesday in front of the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile, the international governing body of motor sports.
“What the peak speed is, I can’t say. We just don’t know,” he said. “Part of the adventure here is we’re going to find out.”
One thing Tuesday’s attempt will assuredly not do is approach the supersonic speeds Green reached with jet power three decades ago.
Green had already been flying supersonic military aircraft when he spotted a newspaper ad that read: “Wanted: High-speed driver to break the sound barrier,” according to the Guinness World Records. In 1997, he traveled faster than the speed of sound and set the outright land speed record — 763.035 mph (1,227.98 kph) — in a car powered by twin jet engines. His runs in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert produced sonic booms that shook the nearby town of Gerlach.
Now 64 years old, Green said he thought he was done racing but came out of retirement when JCB approached him with plans for the new car. The company has invested more than $134 million into hydrogen-powered engines that it says emit no carbon dioxide from the tailpipes.
“If you’re serious about emissions, you have to be serious about hydrogen, and a land speed project is the perfect way to prove it,” JCB Chair Anthony Bamford said at the car's unveiling in May. Bamford has also argued that hydrogen can better handle the demands of heavy industries than electric power.
But hydrogen is only as clean as its source, and the vast majority is currently produced from fossil fuels. JCB signed a deal to buy green hydrogen, which is created using renewable energy but makes up a tiny fraction of global hydrogen production.
Hydrogen combustion engines also present unique safety challenges due to the high pressure and flammability of the gas.
“We're managing the risks very carefully,” Green said. The car endured rigorous testing, and Green said he spent months learning how it responds to the elements, how the engines work in tandem and how to deploy a parachute to slow the car on the low-friction salt crust.
Since the first race there in 1914, the glassy surface of the Bonneville Salt Flats has drawn generations of drivers seeking to set new land speed records. A remnant of a prehistoric lake bed, the salt flats are about 100 miles (160 kilometers) west of Salt Lake City and sit atop an aquifer that cools the tires of the cars.
Spectators must stand about a quarter of a mile (400 meters) from the course's straightaway, which is 10 miles (16 kilometers) long, and often watch through wide-angle binoculars.
The expanse on the border of Utah and Nevada has also been a backdrop for movies including “Independence Day” and “The World’s Fastest Indian,” and the series finale of “Mad Men.”
Green will start about an hour before sunrise Tuesday. His attempt comes a year after a driver going 283 mph (455 kph) died trying to set a land speed record at Bonneville's annual Speed Week. Chris Raschke lost control of his rocketlike vehicle called the Speed Demon last August and died from his injuries.
Rico reported from Atlanta. Video journalist Serge Cartwright contributed reporting.
FILE - Bags of ice are loaded into the vehicle by crew members to act as a radiator before British driver Andy Green set a new unofficial world diesel powered land speed record of over 328 mph over two runs Tuesday, Aug. 22, 2006, on the Bonneville Salt Flats of Utah. (AP Photo/Douglas C. Pizac,File)
FILE - British driver Andy Green gets strapped into his seat before setting a new unofficial world diesel powered land speed record of over 328 mph over two runs Tuesday, Aug. 22, 2006, on the Bonneville Salt Flats of Utah. (AP Photo/Douglas C. Pizac,File)
FILE - This Monday, Aug. 15, 2016, photo, shows the Bonneville Salt Flats International Speedway sign, near Wendover, Utah. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer,File)
FILE - British driver Andy Green goes for a new unofficial world diesel powered land speed record of over 328 mph over two runs Tuesday, Aug. 22, 2006, on the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah. (AP Photo/Douglas C. Pizac,File)
FILE - British driver Andy Green, right, is congratulated by a crew member after setting a new unofficial world diesel powered land speed record of over 328 mph over two runs on the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah on Tuesday, Aug. 2006. (AP Photo/Douglas C. Pizac, File)
