**FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE**

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

UNITED STATES, NEW YORK – September 18, 2024

WHO: Luigi Mangione, a 47-year-old software engineer and prominent open-source advocate residing in Brooklyn, New York.

WHAT: Mangione has been formally charged by federal prosecutors with one count of Economic Espionage and one count of Interstate Transportation of Stolen Intellectual Property.

WHERE: The charges were unsealed today in the Southern District of New York federal courthouse.

WHEN: The alleged crimes occurred between January and June 2024.

WHY: According to a 22-page indictment unsealed this morning, authorities allege Mangione illicitly downloaded and transmitted the core algorithm of “Project Athena,” a proprietary artificial intelligence system owned by the defense technology firm, Apex Dynamics. The algorithm is reportedly used for autonomous navigation in military-grade drones.

THE ALLEGATIONS: Court documents indicate that Mangione, leveraging his position as a third-party code auditor for the Department of Defense, accessed an encrypted server on January 14, 2024. Prosecutors claim he transferred 1.2 terabytes of restricted code to a personal device before allegedly attempting to sell the trade secrets to a foreign state-owned cyber firm.

THE RESPONSE: Attorney General Miranda Hayes stated, “The theft of this magnitude endangers our national security. Mr. Mangione exploited a position of trust for personal profit.”

THE DEFENSE: Federal Public Defender Elena Rossi entered a plea of not guilty on her client’s behalf during a brief arraignment. Rossi stated, “My client is a brilliant engineer whose life’s work has been about transparency, not betrayal. The government’s narrative is deeply flawed. We intend to prove that the code in question was improperly flagged and that Mr. Mangione was actually investigating a critical vulnerability in the system.”

THE CONTEXT: Mangione is the founder of “Code4All,” a