Luigi Mangione latest: Judge could rule if death penalty stays on the table
Luigi Mangione appears for a suppression of evidence hearing in the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in Manhattan Criminal Court, December 18, 2025 in New York City. (Curtis Means-Pool/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — The judge overseeing Luigi Mangione’s federal case may decide on Friday if the death penalty will remain a sentencing option if he’s convicted.
Mangione, who is accused of stalking and killing UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in Midtown Manhattan in December 2024, will return to the federal courtroom on Friday. He has pleaded not guilty to state and federal charges.
The defense argued that stalking “fails to qualify as a crime of violence” and therefore cannot be the predicate to make Mangione eligible for the death penalty if he is convicted of the federal charges. The defense also argued that the decision to seek the death penalty was political and circumvented the federal government’s protocols.
Judge Margaret Garnett has said Mangione would stand trial for the federal case in January 2027 if capital punishment remains on the table, and that the federal trial would begin in October if the death penalty is taken off the table. Either way, she set jury selection for Sept. 8.
Federal prosecutors contend the Altoona Police Department’s search followed departmental procedures. Mangione’s lawyers have argued the backpack search was illegal and police should not have had immediate access to the items inside, including the alleged murder weapon, a notebook and writings.
In making their case for a July 1 state trial, the Manhattan district attorney’s office said the state has a “deep interest” in upholding the right to life, maintaining public order and delivering justice for Thompson’s family.
Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP) signage at a grocery store in Dorchester, Massachusetts, US, on Monday, Nov. 3, 2025. Mel Musto/Bloomberg via Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — A federal judge said Monday that she will continue to block the Trump administration from enforcing a memo directing states to “undo” the issuance of full SNAP benefits.
The administration is currently seeking to “undo” hundreds of millions of dollars in SNAP benefits that went out after the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which operates the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, told states Friday afternoon that it was “working towards implementing November 2025 full benefit issuances” to comply with a court order.
During a tense hearing Monday afternoon, U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani rebuked the Trump administration for “trying to play vindictive games” with states that sent benefits to SNAP recipients.
“It would seem to me that if the agency is trying to comply with the law and with the executive branch’s preferences on policies, a piece of that wouldn’t be trying to play vindictive games with the states. That’s not part of it,” said Talwani, who said she planned to issue a written ruling later Monday.
The USDA sent out its initial guidance after U.S. District Judge McConnell on Thursday ordered the Trump administration to fully fund SNAP by Friday — but on Saturday the USDA told states that they must “immediately undo any steps taken to issue full SNAP benefits for November 2025.”
Twenty states said they had already begun the process of issuing full November benefits.
“What you have right now is confusion of the agency’s own making,” Judge Talwani said.
The Trump administration, meanwhile, asked the Supreme Court Monday to stay the order requiring full payment of November SNAP benefits in order to allow Congress to finalize an end to the ongoing government shutdown without judicial interference.
“The irreparable harms of allowing district courts to inject themselves into the shutdown and decide how to triage limited funds are grave enough to warrant a stay,” wrote Solicitor General John Sauer.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, who paused the order late Friday night, is expected to revisit it Tuesday.
Sauer, in an earlier filing, told the court that if the government reopens, its request would become moot — but in the meantime, the administration is making clear that it still wants the justices to allow it to make an only a partial payment of SNAP benefits for the month.
The administration asked the Supreme Court on Friday for an emergency stay of a ruling by U.S. District Judge John McConnell ordering the administration to fully fund SNAP for the month of November, saying it would partially fund SNAP with approximately $4.5 billion but that it needed the remaining funds to support WIC programs that feed children.
Justice Jackson granted the stay, pending a decision on the administration’s appeal to the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
Late Sunday, the circuit court denied the administration’s appeal, rejecting the administration’s argument that harm suffered by the government by complying with the order would outweigh the harm suffered by the millions of Americans who rely on the food assistance program.
“These immediate, predictable, and unchallenged harms facing forty-two million Americans who rely on SNAP benefits — including fourteen million children — weigh heavily against a stay,” wrote Judge Julie Rikelman.
Terry Rozier #2 of the Miami Heat in action against the Boston Celtics during the second half at Kaseya Center on February 10, 2025, in Miami, Florida. (Carmen Mandato/Getty Images)
(BROOKLYN) — A federal judge in Brooklyn handed down a two-year prison sentence Wednesday to a gambler who prosecutors say defrauded sports betting platforms by using non-public information to place highly profitable wagers tied to the performance of NBA players allegedly in on the scheme.
Timothy McCormack is the first defendant to be sentenced for his role in a sweeping conspiracy allegedly involving former NBA players Terry Rozier and Jontay Porter that McCormack blamed on a gambling addiction.
“I’ve struggled with a gambling addiction for more than half my life,” McCormack said.
Judge LaShann DeArcy Hall expressed some sympathy. “He has an addiction,” she said. “I don’t believe the conduct Mr. McCormack engaged in defines him.”
The judge also agreed with federal prosecutors that McCormack undermined the integrity in sports.
“There is no question this is a serious crime,” DeArcy Hall said. “Sports matters to me as an individual, as it should to society.”
The sentence fell below the four-year sentence the government sought.
A federal prosecutor conceded McCormack was “not as culpable as some of his co-conspirators” but said he contributed to a “cold, hard fraud.”
“Without people like the defendant, these schemes can’t work,” the prosecutor, David Berman, told the judge.
Defense attorney Jeffrey Chartier pushed for a sentence without prison time.
“He was a degenerate gambler,” Chartier said. “It’s one of the ones you could make a movie about.”
Chartier said the betting platforms are “thriving” off of people like his client and told reporters there is “absolutely” some irony in the fact those betting platforms are considered victims in the case.
Porter, a former Toronto Raptor player, pleaded guilty in 2024 to a single count of wire fraud conspiracy in connection with a gambling scheme. He was banned for life from the league and is awaiting sentencing.
Former Miami Heat star Rozier faces federal charges of wire fraud and money laundering. He has pleaded not guilty.
McCormack must report to prison April 20. He then must serve a year of supervised release during which time the judge said he is prohibited from gambling. The judge omitted a secondary prohibition on traveling to a casino, finding it unnecessary.
“Gambling is available on anybody’s phone,” DeArcy Hall said.
An NBA memo from October obtained by ABC News said, “With sports betting now occupying such a significant part of the current sports landscape, every effort must be made to ensure that players, coaches, and other NBA personnel are fully aware of the dire risks that gambling can impose upon their careers and livelihoods; that our injury disclosure rules are appropriate; and that players are protected from harassment from bettors.”
Police officers remain on the scene of a shooting that killed two and wounded at least eight at Brown University on December 13, 2025 in Providence, Rhode Island. (Libby O’Neill/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — Two elite Northeast institutions of higher education have been rocked by horrific acts of gun violence, just days apart.
In the first incident, two people were killed and nine were injured in a mass shooting at Brown University, when a gunman opened fire on the Rhode Island campus, officials said.
Two days later, some 50 miles away in neighboring Massachusetts, an esteemed professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology was killed in a shooting at his home, officials said.
Following a dayslong manhunt, authorities identified the suspect in both shootings as Claudio Manuel Neves Valente, a 48-year-old former Brown graduate student, who attended the school some 25 years ago. Valente, a Portuguese national, and the slain MIT professor both attended the same physics engineering program at Instituto Superior Técnico in Lisbon, the school confirmed to ABC News.
Officials have not yet provided a motive for the back-to-back shootings that left residents of parts of New England on edge for days.
Here’s how the tragic shootings unfolded.
Nov. 26-Nov. 30
Valente, who is believed to have lived in Florida, rents a hotel room in Boston, according to federal officials.
Dec. 1
Valente rents a gray Nissan Sentra with Florida plates from a car rental agency in Boston and then drives to the vicinity of Brown University in Providence, where the vehicle is seen “intermittently” through Dec. 12, according to federal officials.
Dec. 13
A person of interest in the Brown shooting — subsequently believed to be the suspect, Valente — is seen in surveillance footage walking through a residential neighborhood near the campus, beginning around 2 p.m., in images and footage released by the FBI. But police have said they believe he had been around the Brown campus as early as 10 a.m. that day “casing out the area.” The individual is seen dressed from head to toe in dark clothing, including wearing a surgical mask over his face.
Around 2:16 p.m., an unknown person — later identified as a man who introduced himself as John — is seen interacting with the person of interest, according to the arrest warrant affidavit for Valente.
The shooting at Brown occurs at 4:03 p.m. in a lecture hall in the school’s Barus & Holley Engineering building during a final exam review, according to authorities and school officials.
Just after the shooting, a security video captures the person of interest emerging onto Hope Street from what investigators described as “lot 42” on the Brown campus.
The last video in the FBI’s timeline shows the individual walking north on Hope Street at 4:07 p.m.
Valente returns to Massachusetts over the next day, where at some point he switches the plates on his rental car to an unregistered plate out of Maine, according to federal officials.
Dec. 14
A man initially thought to be a person of interest in the Brown shooting is detained at about 3:45 a.m. at a Hampton Inn in Coventry, Providence, according to law enforcement sources and police, though that individual is released hours later without being charged.
Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha says during a late-night press conference that there had been evidence pointing to this individual, but that evidence “now points in a different direction.”
Dec. 15
Authorities release new images and video of the person of interest in the mass shooting at Brown and the FBI announces it is offering a reward of up to $50,000 for information leading to the identification, arrest and conviction of the individual responsible.
That night, authorities respond to a residence in Brookline, Massachusetts, after receiving a report of a man shot at his home, according to the Norfolk County District Attorney’s Office.
The victim is identified by the office as 47-year-old Nuno Loureiro, a Portugal native who is a faculty member in MIT’s departments of Nuclear Science & Engineering and Physics and the director of MIT’s Plasma Science and Fusion Center.
Video surveillance captured Valente in the area of the professor’s apartment that evening, according to federal officials.
Following the shooting, Valente drives to a storage facility in Salem, New Hampshire, which he had rented in November, according to federal officials.
Dec. 16
Loureiro is pronounced dead at an area hospital in the morning, according to the Norfolk District Attorney’s Office.
Authorities release a new image and enhanced video of the person of interest sought in the Brown shooting.
Police received an anonymous tip in the investigation into the Brown shooting referencing a Reddit post in which the poster — later identified as John — called for police to “look into a grey Nissan with Florida plates,” according to the affidavit.
Dec. 17
A Brown University faculty member reports to state police seeing a suspicious vehicle in the area of the campus the morning of Dec. 11, describing it as a gray sedan with Florida plates, according to the affidavit.
Providence police announce they are seeking the public’s help in identifying and speaking to the unknown individual — later identified as John — “who was in proximity of the person of interest” in the Brown shooting.
John approaches Providence police officers at Brown University to report his interaction with the person of interest, according to the affidavit. He tells detectives that he saw the man approach a gray or silver sedan with a Florida license plate the afternoon of Dec. 13 at a location near Brown’s campus, according to the affidavit.
“John informed detectives that he recognized one of the images released to the press as the person he encountered that day, which prompted him to post on Reddit,” the affidavit states.
Detectives trace the vehicle to the one rented by Valente in Boston, according to the affidavit.
Dec. 18
A Rhode Island state court issues a state arrest warrant for Valente, charging him with two counts of murder and 23 felony counts of assault and felony firearms offenses in the Brown shooting.
While executing search warrants on the Salem storage unit facility shortly before 9 p.m., Valente is found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound inside a storage unit, authorities said.
During a late-night news conference, authorities identify the suspect in the Brown mass shooting as Valente and confirm he is believed to be the same man who gunned down Loureiro, saying the professor was the intended target.
Officials say investigators linked the Brown and MIT shootings through the vehicle, financial records and video footage.
ABC News’ Josh Margolin, Aaron Katersky, Jon Haworth and Bill Hutchinson contributed to this report.
