NEW YORK (AP) — Police body camera footage released Friday shows the moment the officers were located and arrested. Luigi Mangione at a Pennsylvania McDonald’s in connection with the shooting death of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson in Manhattan.
In one video, officers ask Mangione to lower the mask he was wearing to hide his identity.
“It’s 100% him,” an officer says eagerly as they step outside to talk out of Mangione’s earshot.
“I told you, man,” another responds off camera.
Later, an officer searches Mangione’s belongings and smiles broadly as she pulls out a pistol cartridge, apparently confirming that they found their suspect.
The trove of videos stems from Mangione’s Dec. 9, 2024, arrest in Altoona, five days after Thompson, a 50-year-old executive from Minnesota, was shot to death as he walked to a midtown Manhattan hotel for his company’s annual investor conference.
A Manhattan judge unsealed the recordings Friday after CNN requested their release. Parts of the videos were shown at a court hearing in December, as Mangione’s lawyers unsuccessfully sought to have key evidence thrown out, including his initial statements to police and items seized at the time of his arrest.
Mangione pleaded guilty in August on federal stalking charges and faces life in prison when he is sentenced in December. He also faces murder charges in New York state court, although those proceedings have been postponed indefinitely as his lawyers seek to have the case thrown out.
The videos released Friday begin as officers descend on the McDonald’s in central Pennsylvania, nearly 300 miles (483 kilometers) from Manhattan.
They find Mangione, the Ivy League graduate descendant of a rich man Family from Maryland, seated at a table wearing ski hats, surgical masks and winter coats. Officers say they are responding to a call about a suspicious person and asking for their name and identification.
“You’re a little nervous right now. Why are you nervous?” an officer asks at one point.
They order him to put his hands on his head and ask him if he has been to New York recently. They confront him about a fake New Jersey driver’s license he offers bearing the name Mark Rosario.
“You are currently the subject of an official police investigation,” an officer warns. “If you give us a false name again, you will be arrested for false ID.”
When Mangione finally tells the truth, they ask why he lied.
“I definitely shouldn’t have,” he responds when asked to write down his real name and spell it out loud.
Other videos show officers patting down Mangione, reading him his rights, handcuffing him and taking him to the station.
While an agent searches him more thoroughly at the police station, another agent searches in his backpack.
The officer finds the 9mm pistol authorities would later confirm that it was used in the murder, along with a silencer and another ammunition magazine. They also recovered the diary that prosecutors said later revealed Mangione’s intention to “wax” a health insurance executive, as well as his other handwritten notes.
“He has a checklist for today,” another officer says, checking off items seized from someone on the phone. “Tomorrow he’s supposed to do an intel check and get a survival kit.”
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