Man who allegedly tried to break Luigi Mangione out of jail is considering a plea, attorney says
Mark Anderson, 36, showed up at MDC-Brooklyn with a barbecue fork and a pizza cutter and, when jail guards asked for credentials, threw papers at them, prosecutors said. (United States District Court Eastern District of New York)
(NEW YORK) — The man who allegedly claimed to be an FBI agent and demanded Luigi Mangione’s release from federal jail is considering whether to plead guilty, his attorney said at a hearing Friday.
Mark Anderson, a 36-year-old from Minnesota, allegedly showed up to the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn in January with a barbecue fork and a pizza cutter and, when jail guards asked for credentials, threw papers at them, according to prosecutors.
Assistant United States Attorney Brandon Davis told the judge that prosecutors extended a plea offer to Anderson, who initially pleaded not guilty to the impersonation charge.
“We’d like some time to review it,” defense attorney Michael Weil said.
Judge Eric Vitaliano set the next court appearance for May 1.
Mangione is being held at MDC-Brooklyn while he awaits federal and state trials for the assassination-style killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in December 2024. His state trial is set to begin in June.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to the media before boarding Marine One on the South Lawn of the White House on April 16, 2026, in Washington, DC. President Donald Trump is traveling to Las Vegas, Nevada to promote the tax cuts he signed into law in the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” ahead of the midterm election. Tomorrow he will deliver remarks at a Turning Point USA event in Phoenix, Arizona. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — Attorneys for President Donald Trump say they are “in discussions” with the Department of Justice to potentially resolve a $10 billion lawsuit that Trump, two of his sons, and his company filed against the Internal Revenue Service earlier this year.
According to a court filing on Friday, lawyers for the Trumps requested a deadline extension so they can “engage in discussions designed to resolve this matter and to avoid protracted litigation.”
President Trump, his sons Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr., and the Trump Organization filed a lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service and Treasury Department in January related to the unauthorized disclosure of tax information during Trump’s first term.
A government contractor with the IRS pleaded guilty in 2023 to stealing the tax information of Donald Trump and other wealthy Americans and leaking it to media outlets in 2019 and 2020.
“Defendants have caused Plaintiffs reputational and financial harm, public embarrassment, unfairly tarnished their business reputations, portrayed them in a false light, and negatively affected President Trump, and the other Plaintiffs’ public standing,” the Trumps said in their lawsuit, which requested $10 billion in damages.
“The Parties are engaging in discussions and need time to work through how to ensure those discussions can take place productively to avoid protracted litigation,” the attorneys said in Friday’s filing with the consent of the DOJ lawyers. “This brief period will allow the Parties to initiate and structure those discussions in a manner that best serves the interests of all Parties and the Court.”
The Department of Justice had not yet responded to the lawsuit and faced an impending deadline this month. Friday’s filing said both sides agreed to the 90-day extension.
A group of former government officials last month filed an amicus brief with the court to raise concerns about the ethics of the president suing his own government for billions.
“This case is extraordinary because the President controls both sides of the litigation, which raises the prospect of collusive litigation tactics,” the amicus filing said. “To treat this case like business as usual would threaten the integrity of the justice system and the important taxpayer and privacy protections at the heart of this case.”
The Trumps, in the suit, argued that the IRS and Treasury Department should have had “appropriate technical, employee screening, security, and monitoring” to prevent the theft of tax information.
Matthew Perry attends the GQ Men of the Year Party 2022 at The West Hollywood EDITION on November 17, 2022 in West Hollywood, California. (Photo by Phillip Faraone/Getty Images for GQ)
(NEW YORK) — The woman reportedly known as the “Ketamine Queen” is set to be sentenced on Wednesday for providing the ketamine that killed Matthew Perry.
Jasveen Sangha admitted in a plea agreement to working with another dealer to provide the “Friends” actor with dozens of vials of ketamine, including the dose that led to his fatal overdose in October 2023 at the age of 54.
Sangha pleaded guilty last year to one count of maintaining a drug-involved premises, three counts of distribution of ketamine, and one count of distribution of ketamine resulting in death or serious bodily injury.
Sangha faces a maximum sentence of 65 years in prison. She is scheduled to be sentenced Wednesday morning local time in Los Angeles federal court.
Prosecutors said in court filings ahead of Sangha’s sentencing that she should serve 15 years in prison for her “cold callousness and disregard for life,” and that she’s shown little remorse, pointing to recorded jail communications in which, they say, Sangha talked about “obtaining ‘trademarks’ and securing book rights on the events of the case.”
In a sentencing memorandum filed last month, prosecutors said Sangha ran a “high-volume drug trafficking business out of her North Hollywood residence,” where she stored, packaged and distributed drugs, including ketamine and methamphetamine, since at least 2019. Prosecutors said Sangha continued to sell “dangerous drugs” even after learning she had sold ketamine that contributed to the overdose deaths of two men: Perry and, years earlier, Los Angeles resident Cody McLaury. McLaury died hours after Sangha sold him four vials of ketamine in 2019, prosecutors said.
“She didn’t care and kept selling,” prosecutors wrote. “Defendant’s actions show a cold callousness and disregard for life. She chose profits over people, and her actions have caused immense pain to the victims’ families and loved ones.”
Sangha “had the opportunity to stop after realizing the impact of her dealing – but simply chose not to,” which warrants a “significant” sentence, prosecutors also said.
The defense, meanwhile, said Sangha, who has been behind bars since her arrest in August 2024, should receive a sentence of time served due to her “demonstrated rehabilitation.”
“She has maintained sustained and exemplary sobriety, and actively engaged in recovery-oriented and rehabilitative programming while in custody, and has tremendously strong family and community support to facilitate successful reentry and reduce the risk of recidivism,” her attorneys, Mark Geragos and Alexandra Kazarian, wrote in a sentencing memorandum filed last month.
In response to the defense sentencing memorandum, prosecutors continued to argue that Sangha has shown a lack of remorse and claimed she has attempted to minimize the harm she’s caused.
“For example, defendant harmed two overdose victims, but her sentencing briefing does not even mention Cody McLaury and only references Matthew Perry in passing, in the context of defendant attempting to downplay her role in his death and to heap the blame on others,” prosecutors wrote in their response, filed last week.
They also argued that Sangha “expressed a similar lack of remorse in recorded jail communications” – including one on Dec. 25, 2024, during which prosecutors said an individual stated, “We’re gonna sell those book rights,” and Sangha allegedly responded, “Oh I know, the plan is in, the f—— trademark is going down,” according to the filing.
“Even if said in jest, this conversation suggests defendant does not appreciate the severity of her offenses, and instead sees her crimes as a potential future revenue stream,” prosecutors wrote. “It also shows that time in custody has, thus far, failed in getting defendant to adequately reflect upon the grave harms she has caused.”
Geragos has previously said that Sangha “feels horrible.”
“She’s felt horrible from day one,” Geragos told reporters outside the courthouse last year following Sangha’s guilty plea. “This has been a horrendous experience.”
In a victim impact statement filed ahead of the sentencing, Perry’s stepmother, Debbie Perry, said the pain caused by the defendant is “irreversible.”
“Please give this heartless woman the maximum prison sentence so she won’t be able to hurt other families like ours,” she wrote.
In addition to Sangha, four other people were charged and pleaded guilty in connection with Perry’s death: the other dealer, Erik Fleming; Kenneth Iwamasa, Perry’s live-in personal assistant; and two doctors, Mark Chavez and Salvador Plasencia.
Prosecutors said Sangha worked with Fleming to distribute ketamine to Perry, and that in October 2023, they sold the actor 51 vials of ketamine that were provided to Iwamasa.
“Leading up to Perry’s death, Iwamasa repeatedly injected Perry with the ketamine that Sangha supplied to Fleming,” the DOJ said in a press release last year. “Specifically, on October 28, 2023, Iwamasa injected Perry with at least three shots of Sangha’s ketamine, which caused Perry’s death.”
Iwamasa pleaded guilty in August 2024 to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine causing death and is scheduled to be sentenced on April 22.
Fleming pleaded guilty in August 2024 to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine and one count of distribution of ketamine resulting in death and is set to be sentenced on April 29.
Chavez and Plasencia have also been convicted for their roles in what prosecutors called a conspiracy to illegally distribute ketamine to Perry.
Chavez, who once ran a ketamine clinic, pleaded guilty in October 2024 to one count of conspiracy to distribute ketamine and was sentenced to eight months home confinement in December 2025.
Plasencia, who briefly treated Perry prior to the actor’s death, pleaded guilty in July 2025 to four counts of distribution of ketamine and was sentenced to 30 months in prison in December 2025.
Nurses on strike rally outside Gov. Hochul’s midtown office after marching from Grand Central Monday, Feb. 2, 2026, in Manhattan, New York. (Barry Williams/New York Daily News/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — The largest nurses strike in New York City history ended this weekend when the last holdouts in the 41-day labor action overwhelmingly voted to ratify a contract and agreed to return to work, officials said.
Around 4,200 members of the New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA) employed by the private New York-Presbyterian system approved on Saturday a contract that includes more than a 12% increase in salaries over the life of the three-year deal.
The nurses and management of the New York-Presbyterian system also agreed to improve enforceable safe staffing standards, boost protection for nurses from workplace violence and, for the first time ever, provide safeguards for employees against artificial intelligence.
The union previously said the hospitals had threatened to cut health care benefits for frontline nurses and roll back safe staffing standards that were won by nurses after a three-day strike in January 2023.
The labor agreement was approved after about 10,500 NYSNA nurses employed by the private Montefiore, Mount Sinai Hospital and Mount Sinai Morningside and West hospitals approved a similar contract last week. Some nurses in the system began returning to work on Saturday, officials said.
About 93% of the NYSNA nurses in the New York-Presbyterian system voted to ratify the contract, and about 7% rejected the deal, which was announced on Thursday, according to the union.
Nearly 15,000 nurses in total walked off their jobs on Jan. 12 after declaring a stalemate in negotiations with management for the private hospital systems, making it the largest nurses’ strike in New York City history.
“This is a proud moment for our union,” NYSNA President Nancy Hagans said in a statement. “We are so happy with the wins we achieved, and now the fight to enforce these contracts and hold our employers accountable begins.”
Hagans added, “NYSNA nurses showed what it means to advocate for patients, and this moment will go down in history as a win for our communities, in the fight for healthcare justice, and for the labor movement.”
In a statement Saturday evening, management of NewYork-Presbyterian confirmed the contract had been ratified by the last group of striking nurses.
“We are pleased to share that we have a new ratified contract with the New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA) and look forward to our nurses’ return to the hospital,” management of the New York-Presbyterian system said. “The new contract reflects our respect for our nurses and the critical role they play as part of our exceptional care teams.”
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul also expressed relief that the strike was finally over.
“Nurses are the backbone of our health care system. I am grateful that NYSNA has overwhelmingly ratified an agreement with New York Presbyterian recognizing the exceptionally difficult work our nurses do day in and out,” Hochul said in a statement.
The governor added, “Throughout this process, I have made clear that my top priority is protecting patients and providing continuity of care. With these agreements now ratified and nurses going back to work, I am confident we can continue to build on the progress made under this administration.”
