Luigi Mangione's Manifesto Could Shake Up Terror Charge, Defense Attorney Says

TMZ

Luigi Mangione’s alleged unhinged manifesto might actually work in his favor -- at least according to one top defense attorney sounding off on the case.

Transcript

00:00If you're Luigi's defense and you know, obviously, they had knowledge of this before, how do

00:09you possibly combat this in court?

00:11Well, there's a few things that the defense is going to do with this, and it's not all

00:15bad for the defense, actually.

00:16I think they can kind of spin it.

00:18There's obviously no question that Luigi Mangione shot and killed the CEO.

00:23That's not in dispute.

00:24The bigger question is the elevated charges that he's facing, specifically the terrorism

00:30charges in both the state and federal cases.

00:33And one of the things that's actually very interesting is that the terrorism charge in

00:38New York has very specific things that need to be proven in order to accomplish that for

00:44a conviction.

00:46And on the defense side, they're going to say that, by Luigi's own words, he was specifically

00:52trying to not endanger other people.

00:54He was specifically targeting only this one person.

00:57I know that's not very mitigating, but in the scheme of what they need to show that it's

01:01a lesser offense than what he's charged with.

01:04So the way that he's charged with terrorism is actually very novel.

01:09And it's risky for the prosecution, because if he is convicted of terrorism for targeting

01:14this one individual, then the case could potentially get overturned altogether.

01:20So certainly there is some openings for the defense here.

01:23And that's not to say anything about the idea that this could have been the result of an

01:26unlawful search and seizure.

01:28They could try to challenge it on a Fourth Amendment ground.

01:31But ultimately, it lays out, on the other hand, very lengthy premeditation and planning,

01:37which is significantly damning for him and helpful to the prosecution and really helpful

01:42for the death penalty that they're seeking in the federal case.

01:46He's going to fight this as much as he possibly can.

01:49And there are ways on the defense side, of course, that somebody could be factually guilty

01:54of something.

01:54But the case falls apart, because ultimately the burden is on the prosecution to prove everything

01:59beyond a reasonable doubt.

02:01There are many things that happen.

02:02People call them technicalities.

02:03But the reality is it's constitutional-based protections that we have.

02:07And if the prosecution fails in some respect and they lose evidence, that's very vital.

02:11The defense's side can become very, very strong.

02:15And you never know what might happen.

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