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Mangione Expected to Plead Guilty & LA Lakers Record-Breaking Sale · Bloomberg Law

0:02
Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Law with June Grossel from Bloomberg Radio.
0:08
Speaker 2: Luigi Mangioni is expected to plead guilty tomorrow to resolve
0:13
Speaker 2: federal charges related to the fatal shooting of United Health
0:17
Speaker 2: Group executive Brian Thompson, and prosecutors will recommend he served
0:23
Speaker 2: life in prison. According to Bloomberg sources, Mangioni faces two
0:28
Speaker 2: federal counts of stalking resulting in depth that carry a
0:32
Speaker 2: potential for life in prison without parole. It wasn't clear
0:36
Speaker 2: what charge or charges Mangioni is expected to plead guilty to,
0:41
Speaker 2: and it's possible that a deal could still fall apart.
0:45
Speaker 2: The twenty eight year old has been charged in both
0:48
Speaker 2: federal and state court in New York, and his state
0:51
Speaker 2: murder trial is set to begin September eighth. The state
0:55
Speaker 2: charges also carry the possibility of a life sentence. Joining
0:59
Speaker 2: me is bloom Legal reporter David Voriakis David tell us
1:03
Speaker 2: what you know about this play deal.
1:06
Speaker 3: Luigimngeone has a hearing scheduled for Friday morning in federal
1:11
Speaker 3: court in Manhattan. The nature of that hearing has not
1:16
Speaker 3: been publicly revealed, but there's a possibility that he could
1:20
Speaker 3: plead guilty in his federal case related to the shooting
1:25
Speaker 3: of Brian Thompson in Midtown Manhattan. He is charged federally
1:32
Speaker 3: with two counts of stalking to cause the death of Thompson,
1:36
Speaker 3: after the judge in that case dismissed a murder charge
1:40
Speaker 3: against him. He separately faces New York state charges of
1:46
Speaker 3: second degree murder and other crimes. So these are all
1:51
Speaker 3: arising from the events surrounding the fatal shooting of Thompson.
1:57
Speaker 3: Before Mangione fled, was a fugitive for five days and
2:03
Speaker 3: was arrested later in Altoona, Pennsylvania.
2:08
Speaker 2: The theory is that if he pleads guilty to the
2:12
Speaker 2: federal crime, then he'll turn around and argue in state
2:17
Speaker 2: court that double jeopardy applies.
2:20
Speaker 3: Right. It's unclear how that's going to play out, but
2:24
Speaker 3: his lawyers have said from the beginning that because he
2:28
Speaker 3: faces two different prosecutions for the same events, that that
2:33
Speaker 3: amounts to double jeopardy. Double jeopardy is not allowed through
2:39
Speaker 3: the US Constitution and also through a New York state law.
2:43
Speaker 3: The analysis of whether this is double jeopardy or not
2:47
Speaker 3: is a bit complex, and it has to do with
2:50
Speaker 3: the elements of each crime in this case, stalking and murder.
2:56
Speaker 3: It's possible that the judge in the New York state
2:59
Speaker 3: case may conclude that there are separate elements to this crime,
3:05
Speaker 3: even though it's essentially the same event, and that double
3:09
Speaker 3: jeopardy does not apply.
3:11
Speaker 2: This strikes me as a huge gamble. He'd be agreeing
3:16
Speaker 2: to serve time in federal prison, probably a long time
3:20
Speaker 2: in federal prison, on the chance that a state judge
3:23
Speaker 2: will rule that this is double jeopardy. It seems really risky.
3:28
Speaker 3: It does seem like a gamble. He has very good lawyers.
3:31
Speaker 3: They've done the legal analysis. It also may be his
3:35
Speaker 3: only real option if he doesn't want to go to trial.
3:39
Speaker 3: If he pleads guilty in federal court, he'll have to
3:42
Speaker 3: admit what he did in open court, and prosecutors in
3:46
Speaker 3: the New York state case can use that against him.
3:50
Speaker 3: Assuming he goes to trial in the state.
3:52
Speaker 2: Case, the two stalking charges. If he's pleading guilty to
3:56
Speaker 2: two stalking charges, that could carry life in prison, which
4:00
Speaker 2: is the top that he would get in state court anyway.
4:03
Speaker 3: That's correct, I mean, that's what he's currently facing in
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Speaker 3: the federal case. It's unclear whether that's what he would
4:09
Speaker 3: actually plead guilty to. Typically, in a plea deal, both
4:14
Speaker 3: sides give up something, so it's possible that he could
4:18
Speaker 3: plead to a reduced charge or maybe only one of
4:21
Speaker 3: the stalking charges. It's not entirely clear what the prosecutors
4:26
Speaker 3: are willing to give here. Since the general consensus is
4:31
Speaker 3: the evidence against Mangeone is quite powerful. This case outraged
4:36
Speaker 3: the public. It's gotten a lot of national attention. Originally,
4:40
Speaker 3: the former Attorney General Pam Bondi, sought the death penalty
4:45
Speaker 3: against Mangione, but the judge in this case dismissed the
4:50
Speaker 3: count that could have potentially led to the death penalty
4:52
Speaker 3: had he been convicted.
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Speaker 2: On that describe some of the evidence here that a
4:57
Speaker 2: lot of people find overwhelming.
5:00
Speaker 3: People have probably seen. There's a lot of video evidence
5:03
Speaker 3: of Mangione on the morning of the shooting. He's been
5:08
Speaker 3: captured on videotape bicycling through New York City in a
5:14
Speaker 3: taxi cab when he was checking into a hostel in
5:20
Speaker 3: the Upper West Side a few days before the shooting.
5:24
Speaker 3: That's evidence that was used in the manhunt that led
5:29
Speaker 3: to his arrest. The police in Pennsylvania also seized his
5:35
Speaker 3: backpack at the time of his arrest, which included a
5:40
Speaker 3: homemade gun, a silencer, a gun magazine, and a variety
5:48
Speaker 3: of writings by Mangione that express extreme animus towards the
5:54
Speaker 3: healthcare system and a desire to shoot a healthcare ceo.
5:58
Speaker 3: I mean, that's just in brief. There's a lot more
6:01
Speaker 3: than that, but those are sort of the highlights, and
6:04
Speaker 3: a lot of legal experts believe it's quite a powerful
6:09
Speaker 3: case that the prosecutors have assembled, which leaves Mangione in
6:14
Speaker 3: a difficult position to try to deny that he's the perpetrator.
6:19
Speaker 2: There was a hearing where Mangioni's lawyers said that he
6:23
Speaker 2: was going to use some kind of emotional distress defense
6:28
Speaker 2: and then withdrew it.
6:30
Speaker 3: They had initially filed court papers saying that they were
6:34
Speaker 3: going to file an emotional disturbance defense that had been
6:39
Speaker 3: under seal for several months. A day after it was unsealed,
6:43
Speaker 3: the defense said they would no longer use that as
6:46
Speaker 3: we understand it, the traditional use of that defense would
6:51
Speaker 3: require a psychological evaluation, and by withdrawing that that is
6:58
Speaker 3: no longer required for the defense. But it is possible
7:02
Speaker 3: that he may use a variation of that defense should
7:06
Speaker 3: he go to trial in state court.
7:09
Speaker 2: He's become a folk hero to some people. He's got
7:13
Speaker 2: admirers who show up at trial. They send him things
7:17
Speaker 2: in the mail, very popular with a certain segment. Are
7:22
Speaker 2: people anticipating that jury selection in the State case would
7:26
Speaker 2: take a long time because of the prosecution trying to
7:30
Speaker 2: filter out those people.
7:32
Speaker 3: I think it probably is going to take a long time. Ultimately,
7:36
Speaker 3: the judge is looking for people who can be fair
7:39
Speaker 3: and unbiased and have an open mind. The prosecutors don't
7:43
Speaker 3: want people who may be secretly rooting for the sort
7:47
Speaker 3: of political arguments that Luigi Mangione has made about the
7:53
Speaker 3: healthcare system. They want people that can judge the case
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Speaker 3: based on the evidence and not his political beliefs.
8:02
Speaker 2: There's a huge amount of interest in this case, and
8:05
Speaker 2: the judge is trying to deal with the press in
8:09
Speaker 2: the case and overflow rooms and tell us about the
8:12
Speaker 2: interest in the case.
8:14
Speaker 3: There was some question in the statecase about whether there
8:18
Speaker 3: would be an overflow room that would allow as many
8:23
Speaker 3: press as possible, or whether there would be a fixed
8:26
Speaker 3: number of media organizations that could observe the proceedings. Earlier
8:32
Speaker 3: this week, Judge Caro ruled that there would be an
8:34
Speaker 3: overflow room and that this was all sort of overblown
8:39
Speaker 3: and he never intended to limit the press. He said
8:42
Speaker 3: that there were eighty six news organizations that are trying
8:46
Speaker 3: to cover the case, So there is a tremendous amount
8:49
Speaker 3: of interest in how this is all going to play out.
8:52
Speaker 3: I would also say that Mangione's followers, known as Manginistas,
8:57
Speaker 3: consistently show up at the pre trial hearings. There's I
9:02
Speaker 3: don't know, thirty or forty or fifty that show up
9:05
Speaker 3: in any given hearing. He also has said in court
9:10
Speaker 3: filings that he has thousands of supporters who have sent
9:16
Speaker 3: him letters or some types of communications. He's raised about
9:20
Speaker 3: a million and a half dollars toward his legal defense.
9:24
Speaker 3: So there's clearly a ground swell of support for Mangione,
9:29
Speaker 3: either for him personally or what his actions represent in
9:34
Speaker 3: protests of the healthcare system in the US.
9:37
Speaker 2: And did the defense at one point float having the
9:41
Speaker 2: proceedings televised.
9:44
Speaker 3: The defense did raise that possibility of having at least
9:48
Speaker 3: some of the proceedings televised. Judge Carrow has not answered that.
9:53
Speaker 3: It appears that that's very unlikely. If, in fact we
9:56
Speaker 3: go to a trial in state court.
9:58
Speaker 2: Well see what happens in court tomorrow. Thanks so much, David.
10:02
Speaker 2: That's Bloomberg Legal reporter David Voriakis. Bob Eiger and Josh
10:10
Speaker 2: Kushner are buying the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team from
10:14
Speaker 2: billionaire Mark Walter for a record breaking price of twelve
10:18
Speaker 2: point five billion dollars. According to Bloomberg sources. It's the
10:22
Speaker 2: highest price ever for a professional sports franchise, exceeding the
10:27
Speaker 2: nine point six billion dollars paid for the National Football
10:30
Speaker 2: League Seattle Seahawks in July. The move comes as Walter's
10:34
Speaker 2: sprawling investment empire is facing scrutiny from federal prosecutors. Federal
10:40
Speaker 2: agents seized Walter's mobile phone and computer last September as
10:45
Speaker 2: part of a wide ranging investigation. Walter's firm, TWG Global
10:51
Speaker 2: has approached multiple investment firms about deals to raise cash
10:55
Speaker 2: to help pay down loans on the books of its
10:57
Speaker 2: insurers that had drawn screwtin from the Justice Department. That's
11:02
Speaker 2: according to people familiar with the matter. Joining me is
11:05
Speaker 2: former federal prosecutor Marissa Darden, head of the White Collar
11:09
Speaker 2: Government Investigations and regulatory practice group at Benish Law Marissa.
11:14
Speaker 2: This huge deal came together over weekend. Reportedly, Kushner called
11:20
Speaker 2: Walter on Friday and the two sides hashed out in
11:24
Speaker 2: agreement by Sunday without using investment banks. What does that
11:29
Speaker 2: tell you?
11:30
Speaker 4: The fact that the Walters Group didn't use investment bankers
11:35
Speaker 4: and also didn't get competing bids suggests that he and
11:40
Speaker 4: or his businesses are dire for cash, and if I
11:43
Speaker 4: had been advising him as a white collar professional, I
11:47
Speaker 4: might have advised that he needed to get liquid in
11:49
Speaker 4: a quick order. As you and Bloomberg has previously reported,
11:53
Speaker 4: Walters has been under the Department of Justice investigation for
11:57
Speaker 4: insurance related issues and other, you know, sort of fraudulent
12:01
Speaker 4: financial transactions since twenty twenty five, and that maybe a
12:06
Speaker 4: signal that things are coming to a head there, or
12:08
Speaker 4: that he's sort of been a desperate need for capital.
12:11
Speaker 2: The federal prosecutors have been examining loans. There's nothing wrong
12:15
Speaker 2: with insurers making loans to related parties, but it has
12:19
Speaker 2: to be disclosed. Just explain what they seem to be
12:23
Speaker 2: looking at.
12:24
Speaker 4: Best I can tell is, you know, again, without knowing
12:26
Speaker 4: all the intricacies and not really having a full grasp
12:31
Speaker 4: of all the holdings. My understanding is that TITWG Global
12:35
Speaker 4: is a holding company that they own stakes in Guggenheim,
12:39
Speaker 4: which is his asset management broker dealer business, as well
12:42
Speaker 4: as various other insurance companies. And as you mentioned, there's
12:46
Speaker 4: no issue in and of itself with insurance companies or
12:50
Speaker 4: insurance brokers like making loans or taking loans or you know,
12:54
Speaker 4: working in that business and in that industry. But there
12:57
Speaker 4: are specific federal guidelines that insurance are supposed to live by,
13:03
Speaker 4: to report these, to document them clearly so that shareholders
13:08
Speaker 4: and other investors are aware of the holdings. And I know,
13:12
Speaker 4: or at least it's been reported that as recently as
13:15
Speaker 4: twenty twenty five and early twenty twenty six, both of
13:19
Speaker 4: those insurance companies that are owned by TWG Global have
13:22
Speaker 4: had to restate billions and billions of dollars in loans
13:26
Speaker 4: that the insurance companies had made and had not properly classified.
13:30
Speaker 4: So I think there's some questions there about whether the
13:33
Speaker 4: Department of Justice, the SEC and other regulators are going
13:36
Speaker 4: to be looking to see if there was any fraudulent
13:40
Speaker 4: responsibility there or if there was any indication that they
13:44
Speaker 4: were trying to defraud investors and insurance premium holders about
13:49
Speaker 4: where these loans came from or what they were doing,
13:52
Speaker 4: or if they were making a profit.
13:54
Speaker 2: So, as a white collar defense lawyer, what would your
13:56
Speaker 2: advice be?
13:58
Speaker 4: So once the Department of Justice and the sec sort
14:02
Speaker 4: of have their tentacles into a business, the investigation can
14:06
Speaker 4: always take interesting turns. And you know the statute of
14:10
Speaker 4: limitations on mail fraud, wire fraud, money laundering, it varies,
14:15
Speaker 4: but more or less is like somewhere around seven years
14:17
Speaker 4: plus or minus, give or take, based on the statute.
14:20
Speaker 4: And so the Department of Justice takes its time right
14:23
Speaker 4: and looking at financial records, issuing subpoenas, looking at bank records,
14:28
Speaker 4: and investigating a large international conglomerate such as the Walters' holdings.
14:36
Speaker 4: You never know what direction they're going to take, so
14:38
Speaker 4: legal fees rack up quickly. The amount of money that
14:42
Speaker 4: it takes to respond to subpoenas and cooperate in an
14:45
Speaker 4: internal federal investigation is very expensive. And then when you
14:50
Speaker 4: ask about sort of paying off the loans, like companies
14:53
Speaker 4: may go in hire forensic accounting services under privilege and
14:57
Speaker 4: try to determine whether there was any wrongdoing or irregularities
15:02
Speaker 4: in advance of the department issuing charges, so that you
15:04
Speaker 4: could go to them proactively and say, hey, look, we've
15:07
Speaker 4: restated our books or we've looked at this and we
15:09
Speaker 4: believe that we've fixed or ameliorated the problem preemptively. But again,
15:14
Speaker 4: that takes a lot of money, that takes time, resources,
15:18
Speaker 4: and a lot of times those legal fees are not
15:20
Speaker 4: covered under insurance premiums, or you might not want to
15:23
Speaker 4: activate your own liability insurance for your business, and then
15:27
Speaker 4: as a result, you're paying that out of pocket. And
15:29
Speaker 4: if you're highly leveraged, like most billionaires are, and those
15:34
Speaker 4: assets or those investments have to be paid, or the
15:37
Speaker 4: investors are demanding repayment, or the market is skittish about
15:41
Speaker 4: an asset management firm or an insurance company being under
15:44
Speaker 4: federal indictment, they could call those loans at any time.
15:48
Speaker 2: Does any of this put the deal to buy the
15:51
Speaker 2: Lakers in jeopardy?
15:52
Speaker 1: It's possible.
15:54
Speaker 4: You know, there's always a couple of things that are
15:56
Speaker 4: tricky when you buy such a big, you know, franchise
16:01
Speaker 4: like this Number one, the NBA sort of has to
16:02
Speaker 4: bless it right, And there are all kinds of clauses
16:06
Speaker 4: sale clauses that are usually written into contracts like this,
16:10
Speaker 4: an asset purchase agreement that says, hey, if we uncover
16:13
Speaker 4: any financial mismanagement or wrongdoing that may negate the deal.
16:18
Speaker 4: There are safe harbors that might be contemplated statutorily, both
16:22
Speaker 4: state and federal, so that if the purchaser were to
16:25
Speaker 4: determine that there have been some mismanagement of funds within
16:29
Speaker 4: the Lakers organization, that that could negate the deal. But
16:33
Speaker 4: as a general matter, you know, I think if people
16:36
Speaker 4: feel like this is a legitimate offer, it's for two
16:40
Speaker 4: billion dollars or plus or minus more than what he
16:42
Speaker 4: paid for it two years ago, and they you know,
16:46
Speaker 4: the NBA doesn't have an issue with it, and they
16:48
Speaker 4: otherwise meet the requirements of an owner, I don't see
16:51
Speaker 4: this being an impediment.
16:53
Speaker 2: When he bought the Lakers just over a year ago,
16:57
Speaker 2: the deal was valued at ten billion, and that was
16:59
Speaker 2: the large ever in the control sale of a sports franchise.
17:03
Speaker 2: Now it's a record price again for US sports franchise.
17:09
Speaker 2: Our investors really sort of hooked on the big name franchises.
17:15
Speaker 2: Just this week, Apollo Global Management agreed to invest two
17:19
Speaker 2: point six billion in the Yankees, and then you have
17:21
Speaker 2: the English soccer team and talks to sell a stake
17:24
Speaker 2: to Jeff Bezos. Billionaires want sports franchises for a lot
17:29
Speaker 2: of different reasons.
17:31
Speaker 1: It's a really interesting question.
17:33
Speaker 4: And actually the NFL, I think, is the last of
17:35
Speaker 4: the big leagues to authorize private equity and investment group
17:39
Speaker 4: ownership and teams.
17:41
Speaker 1: And I think for a long time all of those.
17:44
Speaker 4: Major sports organizations were very skittish about this for the
17:48
Speaker 4: obvious reasons, right like, how do you go about.
17:50
Speaker 1: Vetting those organizations?
17:53
Speaker 4: Are there opportunities for illicit transactions or other mismanagement?
17:59
Speaker 1: That is, and from an individual owner and owner group.
18:02
Speaker 4: Historically, particularly in the NFL less so and maybe the
18:05
Speaker 4: NBA and more so in the MLB, your typical owner
18:09
Speaker 4: was like an individual, like one guy who got rich
18:14
Speaker 4: on something else and invested their money in a franchise
18:17
Speaker 4: because they loved the sport, because they were excited about
18:20
Speaker 4: the value proposition, but mostly because of their desire to
18:24
Speaker 4: be in the game and to live vicariously through the
18:28
Speaker 4: players in something that they really love. And over time,
18:32
Speaker 4: more and more investors and more and more sort of
18:35
Speaker 4: neu vau Riche have learned that it's not just to
18:38
Speaker 4: be around the sport and the sort of sexiness of
18:41
Speaker 4: all that, but it's also this huge investment opportunity that
18:45
Speaker 4: can make a huge return. Because the NFL has exponentially
18:49
Speaker 4: grown over the last twenty five years, the NBA is
18:53
Speaker 4: making record dollars and selling out record ticket numbers, and
18:57
Speaker 4: so I think it was sort of inevitable that billionaire
18:59
Speaker 4: asset classes and high profile investment groups and private equity
19:04
Speaker 4: management ownership groups were going to come and see the
19:08
Speaker 4: bottom line, our live potential of some something that's so
19:12
Speaker 4: huge and that keeps its cachet year over year.
19:15
Speaker 2: I'm just amazed that this came together over a weekend.
19:19
Speaker 4: I'm just really curious to see what the response is
19:23
Speaker 4: from Kushner and Iiger, who the potential purchasers of the
19:28
Speaker 4: Lakers are. Like, these are obviously very savvy investors. People
19:32
Speaker 4: maybe know Bob Vikers, Disney and Josh Kushner has made
19:36
Speaker 4: a huge fortune on his own being part of the
19:38
Speaker 4: Kushner family, but also you know, having his own fund,
19:42
Speaker 4: his own private equity shop that he has made investments
19:45
Speaker 4: in other sports teams and the scrutiny on this, I
19:48
Speaker 4: think is going to be very high, So it'll be
19:49
Speaker 4: very interesting to see how they respond to all the
19:52
Speaker 4: media attentions.
19:53
Speaker 1: And how they can justify their evaluation of the offer.
19:57
Speaker 4: Because if you don't have competing bids or a competitive option,
20:00
Speaker 4: what due diligence did they do to actually determine a
20:03
Speaker 4: fair market value of the Lakers in twenty twenty six?
20:06
Speaker 2: A lot of questions yet, Thanks so much, Marissa. That's
20:10
Speaker 2: Marissa Darden, head of the White Collar Government Investigations and
20:14
Speaker 2: Regulatory Practice Group at Banish Law. And that's it for
20:18
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