UnitedHealthcare CEO murder suspect charged with murder in New York, court records show
ALTOONA, Pennsylvania — After On a New York sidewalk, police searched for the masked shooter with dogs, drones and divers. The officers used the city one . Investigators analyzed DNA samples, fingerprints and Internet addresses. Police went door-to-door looking for witnesses.
When an arrest came five days laterthese sprawling investigative efforts shared the merit of an alert civilian’s instincts. A McDonald’s customer in Pennsylvania noticed another customer who looked like the man in oblique security camera photos released by the New York Police Department.
Luigi Nicolas MangioneA 26-year-old Ivy League graduate from a prominent Maryland real estate family was arrested Monday for the murder of Brian Thompson
He remained imprisoned in Pennsylvania, where he was initially charged with possessing a firearm without a license, forgery and providing false identification to police. By late evening, Manhattan prosecutors had added a murder charge, according to an online court filing. He should eventually be extradited to New York.
It is unclear whether Mangione has an attorney capable of commenting on the allegations. When asked during Monday’s arraignment whether he needed a public defender, Mangione asked if he could “answer that question at a later date.”
Mangione was arrested in Altoona, Pennsylvania, after a McDonald’s customer recognized him and warned an employee, authorities said. Police in Altoona, about 375 kilometers west of New York, were quickly summoned.
They arrived and found Mangione sitting at a table in the back of the restaurant, wearing a blue medical mask and looking at a laptop, according to a Pennsylvania police criminal complaint.
He first gave them a fake ID, but when a police officer asked Mangione if he had recently been to New York, he “went silent and started shaking,” the complaint states.
When he lowered his mask at the officers’ request, “we knew he was our guy,” rookie Officer Tyler Frye said at a news conference in Hollidaysburg.
New York Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said at a news conference in Manhattan that Mangione was carrying a gun like the one used to kill Thompson and the same fake ID the shooter used to check into a New York inn, along with a passport and other fraudulent IDs.
NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny said Mangione also had a three-page handwritten document that shows “some ill will toward corporate America.”
A law enforcement official who was not authorized to publicly discuss the investigation and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity said the document included a line in which Mangione claimed to have acted alone.
“To the federal government, I will be brief, because I respect what you do for our country. To spare you a lengthy investigation, I clearly state that I was not working with anyone,” the document states, according to the official.
There was also a line that said, “I apologize for any conflict or trauma, but this had to be done.” Frankly, these parasites simply had it coming.”
Pennsylvania prosecutor Peter Weeks said in court that Mangione was found with a passport and $10,000 in cash, including $2,000 in foreign currency. Mangione disputed the amount.
Thompson, 50, was killed last Wednesday as he walked alone to a midtown Manhattan hotel for an investor conference. Police quickly realized the shooting was a targeted attack by an armed man who appeared to be waiting for Thompson, walked up behind him and licensed a 9mm pistol.
Investigators said ‘delay’, ‘deny’ and ‘file’ were written .
From surveillance video, New York investigators understood that the shooter fled on a bicycle into Central Park, got out, then took a taxi to a bus terminal in northern Manhattan .
Once in Pennsylvania, he drove from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh, “trying to keep a low profile” by avoiding cameras, said Lt. Col. George Bivens of the Pennsylvania State Police.
A grandson of a wealthy, self-made real estate developer and philanthropist, Mangione is a cousin of a current Maryland state legislator. Mangione was valedictorian at his elite Baltimore prep school, where his 2016 graduation speech praised his classmates’ “incredible courage to explore the unknown and try new things.”
“Our family is shocked and devastated by Luigi’s arrest,” Mangione’s family said in a statement posted Monday evening on social media by his cousin, Maryland lawmaker Nino Mangione. “We offer our prayers to Brian Thompson’s family and ask people to pray for everyone involved.”
Like other residents of the shared penthouse aimed at remote workers, Mangione underwent a background check, said Josiah Ryan, a spokesperson for owner and founder RJ Martin.
At Surfbreak, Martin learned that Mangione had suffered from severe back pain since childhood that interfered with many aspects of his life, from surfing to romance, Ryan said.
“He went surfing with RJ once, but it didn’t work out because of his back,” Ryan said, while noting that Mangione and Martin often went to a climbing gym together.
Mangione left Surfbreak to have surgery on the mainland, Ryan said, then returned to Honolulu and rented an apartment.
In the days following the shooting, the New York Police Department collected hundreds of hours of surveillance video and released several clips and still images in hopes of attracting public attention to help find a suspect.
“This combination of old-fashioned detective work and new-age technology is what led to this result today,” Tisch said at the New York press conference.
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