Death penalty is appropriate

I'm a firm supporter of the death penalty in appropriate cases. Premeditated murder is one of those cases. The killer, with malice in his heart toward his victim, has planned out the murder.

A premeditated murder is not a heat-of the-moment killing in which the killer has become enraged at his victim and used the deadliest weapon available to kill him at the time. Although the murderer intended, at the end, to kill his victim, it wasn't planned out in advance. It's a crime that needs to be punished by proper authority, but it isn't a crime that calls for death.

A premeditated murder is different. It is a cold blooded action. The murderer has thought it through, planed it out and carried it out. It also includes advanced planning about how he thinks he can get away with it.

It is proper for the appropriate authority to put such a person to death.

United States Attorney General Pam Bondi has instructed federal prosecutors to seek the death penalty against Luigi Mangione. Mangione is accused of killing UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in early December as he walked down a Manhattan street to attend an investor conference.

Prosecutors say Mangione waited for Thompson outside a Manhattan hotel and shot him multiple times in the back with a semi-automatic pistol. Surveillance camera footage shows a man, who police say is Mangione, walking up behind Thompson and shooting him full of holes at short range.

Mangione is currently held in jail without bond. However, it should be remembered that, under U. S. law, a person is considered innocent unless and until he is found guilty in a court of law. Mangione has not faced trial yet. In pressing charges against a person, the prosecution has to specify what the person is being charged withand the penalty they seek, including the death penalty.

The crime that Mangione is being accused of can be punished by the death penalty if he is convicted. The murderer of Thompson clearly waited for him. He had obviously been selected by the killer for death so it was clearly a premeditated crime.

Notebooks found in Mangione's possession indicated that, if he is the killer shown in the surveillance photos, it appears that Mangione intended to kill an insurance executive and any health insurance executive would do. Thompson turned out to be the selected victim.

If the information the prosecution has in the case is correct, then the person who shot Thompson planned out the killing in advance. He used a weapon that was intended to inflict fatal injuries and fired sufficient bullets into Thompson's body to kill. It was done with malice.

This is not a matter of what you think of the health insurance industry. It doesn't matter if you think health care insurance business executives are all a bunch of stinkers. It doesn't matter what you think of Brian Thompson. What matters is that a man was killed with deliberate malice in a cold blooded act that was not self-defense.

For millennia, society has believed that a man who, out of malice, carries out a premeditated murder ought to have the death sentence imposed on him by society.

The killer of Brian Thompson deserves the death penalty.