Police arrested a 26-year-old man on Monday on firearm charges and publicly identified him as a person of interest in the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, the executive gunned down on a busy midtown Manhattan sidewalk last week.
The New York Police Department said the man was being held near Altoona, Pennsylvania, after an employee at a local McDonald’s thought the looked suspicious and called police.
“At this time he is believed to be our person of interest in the brazen, targeted murder of Brian Thompson, CEO of UnitedHealthcare last Wednesday in midtown Manhattan,” NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch said at a press conference alongside Mayor Eric Adams.
Tisch identified the person of interest as Luigi Mangione. The commissioner said he had a three-page manifesto on his person that speaks to his possible alleged “motivation and mindset” in the killing.
“We don’t think there is any specific threats to other people mentioned in that document, but it does seem that he has some ill will towards corporate American,” Chief of Detectives Joe Kenny said.
Once at the police station, police said, officers discovered the man had a gun similar to the one used in Thompson’s killing, as well as a silencer and a fake New Jersey ID. The suspected gunman allegedly used a fake New Jersey ID when he checked into a Manhattan hostel last month, sources had said.
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Mangione had a ghost gun, a type of weapon that can be assembled at home from parts without a serial number, making them difficult to trace, investigators said. He has not been charged at this time.
Two senior law enforcement officials said the man in Altoona being questioned had the name “Mark Rosario” on his fake NJ ID. Three sources familiar with the matter said the suspected gunman checked into the hostel using a fake NJ ID with the name “Mark Rosario.”
Mangione reportedly graduated in 2016 as valedictorian from Gilman School, an all-boys high school in Baltimore, Maryland. Police believe he attended college in Pennsylvania.
Police said the 26-year-old was born and raised in Maryland, has ties to San Francisco and a last known address in Honolulu, Hawaii.
Kenny said that police did not have his name prior to Monday and that Mangione has no known prior arrests in the country.
“At some point, we’ll work out through extradition to bring him back to New York to face charges here, working with the Manhattan District Attorney’s office,” Kenny said.
Tracking a killer
Aided by surveillance cameras on nearly every building and block, police have been able to retrace the shooter’s movements.
They know he ambushed Thompson at 6:44 a.m. as the executive arrived at the Hilton for his company’s annual investor conference, using a 9 mm pistol that resembled the guns farmers use to put down animals without causing a loud noise. They know ammunition found near Thompson’s body bore the words “delay,” “deny” and “depose,” mimicking a phrase used by insurance industry critics.
Kenny said the fact that the shooter knew UnitedHealthcare group was holding a conference at the hotel and what route Thompson might take to get there suggested that he could possibly be a disgruntled employee or client.
Investigators know from surveillance video that the shooter fled into Central Park on a bicycle and ditched it around 7 a.m. near 85th Street.
He then walked a couple blocks and got into a taxi, arriving at 7:30 a.m. at the George Washington Bridge Bus Station, which is near the northern tip of Manhattan and offers commuter service to New Jersey and Greyhound routes to Philadelphia, Boston and Washington.
Investigators don’t know what happened next. They are searching through more surveillance video but have yet to locate video of the shooter getting on a bus or exiting the station.
Police have determined from video that the gunman was in the city for 10 days before the shooting. He arrived at Manhattan’s main bus terminal on a Greyhound bus that originated in Atlanta, though it’s not clear whether he embarked there or at one of about a half-dozen stops along the route.
Immediately after that, he took a cab to the vicinity of the Hilton and was there for about a half hour, Kenny said.
At around 11 p.m. on the night he arrived, he went by taxi to the HI New York City Hostel. It was there, while speaking with an employee in the lobby, that he briefly pulled down the mask and smiled, giving investigators the brief glimpse they are now relying on to identify and capture a killer.
NYPD detectives traveled to Atlanta to coordinate efforts there.
