Accused healthcare CEO slayer Luigi Mangione has influenced others to kill for political reasons — including the deranged mass killer who shot up NFL headquarters last month, according to prosecutors seeking the death penalty.
When Mangione, 27, killed UnitedHealthcare honcho Brian Thompson on Dec. 4 he meant for it “to resonate beyond this specific victim and to generate scorn, outrage, or fear toward the health insurance sector more broadly,” Manhattan federal prosecutors wrote in court papers Wednesday.
“The defendant hoped to normalize the use of violence to achieve ideological or political objectives,” continued the filing, part of a push for the death penalty.
Prosecutors say Luigi Mangione, accused of killing the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, has inspired others to embrace violence over reasoned debate. AP“Since the murder, certain quarters of the public — who openly identify as acolytes of the defendant — have increasingly begun to view violence as an acceptable, or even necessary, substitute for reasoned political disagreement.”
Prosecutors pointed to Shane Tamura, 27, who stormed the NFL building with an assault rifle just “a short distance away from where Mangione killed Thompson” in midtown Manhattan.
Tamura killed four and injured an NFL employee, before turning the gun on himself when he failed to get on the right floor for the NFL.
“Like Mangione, Tamura left behind a piece of evidence for investigators to find, blaming the NFL and football for causing chronic traumatic encephalopathy,” prosecutors wrote. “Almost immediately, members of the public sympathetic to the defendant touted Tamura’s actions as a laudable continuation of the defendant’s philosophy.”
Mangione, who pleaded not guilty to state and federal charges, was arrested five days after the Dec. 4 killing of CEO Brian Thompson (above). AP
Law enforcement officers work near evidence markers placed where shell casings were found at the scene where Thompson was shot and killed in Midtown Manhattan. REUTERSMangione allegedly left behind a “manifesto” in a red spiral-bound notebook found in his backpack when he was arrested, which laid out his plans and rationale for killing Thompson — the 50-year-old dad of two.
“Wack [sic] the CEO at the annual parasitic bean-counter convention,” Mangione scrawled in the notebook on Oct. 22, six weeks before he followed through with his plan.
The feds made the arguments in court papers related to their efforts to seek the death penalty in Mangione’s case, arguing that he “poses a continuing danger not only in a personal capacity, but also because he has sought to influence others.”
Following Mangione’s arrest five days after Thompson’s killing, he “openly cultivated supporters,” the feds said.
The NFL headquarters gunman, identified as Shane Tamura, left behind a handwritten note blaming the league and football for causing chronic traumatic encephalopathy, prosecutors noted. AP
A video screen grab of the scene of the shooting on East. 52nd St. and Park Avenue. Obtained by the NY PostMangione — an Ivy League grad — has gained a cult-like following of supporters online in part because of rise in disillusionment toward the healthcare industry and because of his good looks.
He has crowdfunded over $1.2 million for his legal defense. And some of his obsessed admirers have even gotten tattoos of him on their bodies.
Mangione — who’s behind bars in a Brooklyn federal lockup — has pleaded not guilty to both federal and state charges. A trial date has not yet been set in the federal case.
With Post wires
