According to online court documents, the man who is suspected of shooting UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson last week outside a crowded hotel in New York City was charged with murder on Monday night.
Luigi Mangione, 26, showed up for a preliminary arraignment in Pennsylvania, where he was detained earlier in the day at a McDonald’s in the city of Altoona, just hours before the murder and weapons charges were filed in New York. There, he was accused of three misdemeanors: tampering with documents or identification, possessing tools of crime, and giving false identification to police authorities, in addition to two felonies: forgery and carrying a handgun without a license.
Following the court hearing in Pennsylvania, law enforcement officials informed media that charges would soon be brought in New York.
Mangione has been charged with one crime of murder, three counts of criminal possession of a weapon, and one count of possession of a falsified instrument, according to court documents available online.
A request for comment Monday night was not immediately answered by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.
For days, police had been searching for the alleged shooter in Thompson’s murder, sharing images and footage of the perpetrator of the CEO’s targeted assault.
Police said they found a revolver identical to the one used in the deadly shooting after a McDonald’s employee alerted them on Monday about a suspicious individual in the Altoona restaurant.
According to authorities, Mangione apparently had a phony ID with the same name the alleged shooter used at a hostel in New York City. According to investigators, a pistol silencer was also discovered.
A handwritten document that “speaks to both his motivation and mindset” was also discovered by investigators, NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch told reporters on Monday.
NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny stated that Mangione seemed to harbor “ill will toward corporate America,” however police did not elaborate on a potential cause.
Around 6:45 a.m. on December 4, Thompson, 50, was traveling to the New York Hilton Midtown for UnitedHealth Group’s investor conference when a masked shooter came up behind him and started shooting, according to CCTV footage.
Police thought the health care executive was the only person the shooter meant to shoot because several pedestrians had passed him before he shot Thompson.
Thompson was declared dead at Mount Sinai West after being shot in the leg and back.
According to investigators, the man left the area on foot before riding into Central Park.
Police classified Thompson’s death as a deliberate, preplanned targeted attack within hours of the shooting.
A cellphone was discovered close by, along with three live 9 mm rounds and three discharged 9 mm round casings.
According to the authorities, the phrases “deny,” “delay,” and “depose” were scrawled in marker on three of the seized rounds of ammo, one on each.
According to his wife Paulette Thompson, Thompson, who resides in Minnesota, has received threats recently but has not changed his travel schedule.
At the time of the incident, he was not accompanied by a security detail.
Hours after the assault, Paulette Thompson admitted to NBC News that there had been some threats. Basically, a lack of coverage, I guess? Details are unknown to me. All I know is that he claimed that some individuals had been threatening him.
According to police, the shooter traveled from Atlanta to New York City on a Greyhound bus on November 24. He stayed at a hostel on the Upper West Side and hardly ever removed or pulled down his mask.
According to authorities, he paid with cash and is believed to have used a false identity to check into the hostel.
Police searched the city for the weapon and other evidence after the shooting. In an effort to identify the man, authorities have made public a number of images of a person of interest.
According to representatives of the Ivy League university, Mangione earned a bachelor’s degree in engineering and a master’s degree in science engineering from the University of Pennsylvania in May 2020. According to public documents and his social media accounts, he has worked for the University of Pennsylvania and resided in Philadelphia and Hawaii.
Mangione completed high school at Baltimore’s Gilman School, a private, all-boys institution. According to the school, he graduated in 2016.
Thompson’s murder shocked the business and medical communities, prompting concerns about the proper amount of security for senior executives.
According to the company’s two most recent proxy statements, UnitedHealth Group did not routinely provide executives with personal protection services. Businesses are required to disclose security expenditures for corporate officials or directors that exceed $10,000 per year.
In their most recent proxy statements, Humana and Cigna, two other significant health care behemoths, both claimed to offer CEOs personal security. However, those documents did not specify whose executives were protected or the amount of money spent.
According to regulatory filings, CVS Health, another significant player in the health insurance market, mandates that its CEO use corporate planes and a corporate driver as part of a stated executive protection program.
A dark, incensed American perspective on private health professionals was also revealed by the shooting, as many social media users either celebrated Thompson’s death or offered potential justifications for his murder.
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