Photo of Luigi Mangione taken in a holding cell on Monday courtesy of the Altoona Police Department.
The Altoona Police Department
New York prosecutors on Monday charged Ivy League grad Luigi Mangione with the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, court records show.
The charge came hours after Mangione was arraigned in a Pennsylvania courtroom on gun and other charges related to his arrest earlier Monday at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania.
Mangione, 26, was charged by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office with murder, criminal possession of a loaded firearm, possession of a silencer, and possession of a forged instrument in state court in Manhattan on Monday night, according to a court record.
The University of Pennsylvania graduate is accused of fatally shooting Thompson last Wednesday morning outside the Hilton Hotel in midtown Manhattan.
Thompson, a 50-year-old father of two, was headed to an investor meeting for UnitedHealth Group, which owns his company when he was shot by a masked gunman with a pistol that appeared to have a silencer attached.
UnitedHealthcare is the largest private health insurer in the United States, with more than $200 billion in annual revenue.
Thompson’s family held a private funeral for him in Minnesota earlier Monday, as Mangione was being taken into custody and questioned by Altoona police.
Police said that a backpack belonging to Mangione was found to contain a gun, silencer and multiple rounds of 9mm ammunition after he gave officers a fake New Jersey ID that is believed to be the same one he used to check into a Manhattan hostel in late November.
A McDonald’s worker had called police after becoming suspicious of Mangione, who was wearing a mask while sitting at a table in the restaurant.
Altoona police said that when Mangione removed his mask at their request they immediately recognized him as the person sought by New York authorities in connection with Thompson’s killing.
Mangione, who comes from a wealthy Baltimore-area family, is being held without bond at a jail in Pennsylvania on the charges in that state relating to the gun and phony IDs he was carrying.
Before his arrest in Altoon, police in New York did not know his identity even as they sought a “person of interest” who was seen on surveillance images traveling to and from the scene of Thompson’s slaying.
Authorities believe the gunman fled New York within hours of that shooting, possibly in a bus from the Port Authority terminal in Washington Heights, in northern Manhattan.
This is breaking news. Please refresh for updates.
