Mangione Didn’t Practice Jury Nullification

Letter to Romans: What happened to Luigi Mangione’s early claim his assassinating United Health’s CEO was justified by lame insurance claim denials? By pleading guilty, his lawyers also backed off NY’s “extreme emotional disturbance” statutory excuse…

Recall “The Practice” episode in which a righteous dad coolly planned & executed a rich man who had somehow got off brutally murdering his only daughter. We were told “jury nullification” is never a legit defense in a murder trial. So, The Practice attorneys defending the dad had to come up with a way to urge the jurors to say “not guilty” regardless of the law. Their supposedly legally dubious gambit: Something called, “moral justification or necessity.” Well, given the mountain of physical evidence against Mangione, his defense team was similarly faced with the need for a kind of Hail Mary defense. Mangione’s own brainstorm that he was justified by his outrageous ordeal with a cheap insurer was DOA. The meticulous stalking leading up to the assassination that he carried out was just as outrageously premeditated. Not only was the claim unconvincing but it admitted to being a vigilante. The defense had then announced it intended to argue NY’s “Extreme Emotional Disturbance” or EED statute, until someone reminded them it required … an ABSENCE of premeditation.

Apparently, Mangione’s lawyers finally realized their best hope was to admit to just the DOJ’s stalking murder charge. True, that meant he’d face a possible life sentence, but even if he got the max it would be in a relatively decent federal prison; meanwhile, the change in strategy would allow for the defense to challenge the still upcoming state murder trial on double jeopardy grounds. Will Mangione yet regret his lawyers didn’t take its chances at an acquittal with a gullible jury that might buy its “moral necessity” Hail Mary, the law be damned? It worked for The Practice. Maybe not so much in real life?

Davd Soul