Karen Friedman Agnifilo fears her client won’t get a fair trial. In a New York City courtroom on December 23, 2024, the criminal defense attorney argued government officials had been making prejudicial statements about Luigi Mangione, the 26-year-old accused of fatally shooting UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in NYC on December 4, 2024.

Mangione is being treated as a “spectacle,” she claimed, with authorities putting him “on display” in “the biggest staged perp walk I’ve ever seen in my career.” The judge promised the proceedings would be fair, vowing, “We will carefully select a jury.”

But no one knows what that jury will do. In recent weeks, there’s been speculation that the Maryland native, who’s experienced a swell of popularity and support on social media amid growing criticism concerning the tactics employed by insurance companies to deny care, could be set free. Experts point to a phenomenon known as “jury nullification,” which happens when a jury might believe a defendant committed a crime but votes to acquit anyway.

“It’s a reaction by the jury to a legal result that they feel would be so unjust or morally wrong that they refuse to impose it, despite what the law says,” Cheryl Bader, an associate professor of law at Fordham University Law School, says.

Sympathy vs. Evidence in Luigi Mangione’s Case

The jury selection process is designed to weed out people who won’t be impartial. However, Clay S. Conrad, author of Jury Nullification: The Evolution of a Doctrine, says, “It would not surprise me at all if one or more people get onto the jury who support him.”

Even so, some legal experts doubt a jury would set a killer free in the face of compelling evidence. “Most of us hate insurance companies and have had difficult experiences dealing with insurance companies, but that doesn’t mean we think people should be going around murdering insurance executives in the street,” Gregory Germain, a Syracuse University College of Law professor, says.

Mangione, who’s pleaded not guilty to state murder and terrorism charges and next month is expected to enter a plea in a parallel federal murder case, could also, of course, be acquitted or convicted based strictly on the evidence. According to police, that includes a 3D-printed gun found in his backpack that matches shell casings discovered at the crime scene, plus fingerprints taken from a water bottle and protein bar wrapper discarded nearby.

No one really knows how a jury will ultimately react to a perceived “modern-day Robin Hood” like Mangione. “I have never seen a criminal defendant, much less an accused murderer, receive as much sympathy both on traditional media and social media,” former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani marvels. “He is a folk hero of sorts to many.”