Luigi Mangione, the man arrested for the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, was arraigned in a Manhattan court on Monday on state charges where he pleaded not guilty to the counts against him.
Mangione was indicted by a grand jury on one count of first-degree murder and two counts of second-degree murder, one of which is murder in the act of terrorism. He was also charged with multiple counts of criminal possession of a weapon and one count of second-degree criminal possession of a forged instrument. Mangione pleaded not guilty to all 11 charges, NBC News reported.
During the Monday morning hearing, Mangione’s attorney, Karen Friedman Agnifilo, expressed concerns over whether her client would receive a fair trial, saying that Mangione was being treated like a "human ping pong ball" and "political fodder."
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said when announcing the charges Mangione had been charged for the "brazen, targeted, and premeditated shooting of Brian Thompson."
Mangione was originally going to be arraigned on Thursday, but that was postponed after federal authorities announced charges of their own against Mangione and he was taken to a federal courthouse instead.
Agnifilo said in court, "In over three decades of prosecuting and defending criminal cases in New York, frankly, I've never seen anything like that what is happening here," calling it "very confusing" and "highly unusual."
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