Luigi Mangione was arrested on 9th December 2024 as a suspect in the deadly shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. He was charged with firearms charges including forgery, firearms not to be carried without a license, tampering with records or identification, possessing instruments of crime, and false identification to law enforcement.
His photos from before and after the shooting from CCTVs have been circulating online for days as the detectives spent days finding leads to the shooter.
Luigi Mangione named person of interest in CEO shooting
New York Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch told reporters during a news conference that Luigi was believed to be a person of interest in the shooting. Officers arrested him on Monday morning at the Altoona McDonald’s after a McDonald’s customer alerted an employee who called police, officials said.
The commissioner added that Magione was acting suspiciously while being questioned by the officers. He was found by the Altoona officers sitting at a table in the back of the McDonald’s wearing a blue medical mask and looking at a laptop with a backpack on the floor near the table. The police immediately recognized him after they asked him to pull his mask down. Altoona Patrolman Tyler Frye told reporters during a news conference that;
“My partner and I recognized him immediately, Just from what we saw in the media, with photos, videos, we just didn’t even think twice about it, we knew that was our guy.”
The officers found out that Luigi had multiple fraudulent IDs and a U.S. passport. One of the IDs matched the fake New Jersey ID that the shooting suspect used to check into a Manhattan hostel before the shooting, the commissioner said.
When he was asked by the officers for his ID, he gave them the New Jersey ID. When he was later asked if he had been to New York, Mangione became quiet and started to shake,” according to the affidavit.
“That really invoked a physical reaction from the suspect, He became visibly nervous, kind of shaking at that question, and he didn’t really answer it directly, so that statement alone really said a lot, and the suspect didn’t have to say a lot after that question to show that, you know, he was very nervous at that point.”
Mangione provided his real name after he was told he would be arrested if he lied about his identity. The officers found a gun and a suppressor on Mangione that were consistent with the weapon used in the Dec. 4 shooting of Thompson including clothing and a mask consistent with those of the suspect.
Luigi had an account on Goodreads
On the Goodreads website, Luigi’s account contained a four-star rating and review of “Industrial Society and Its Future,” written by Theodore John Kaczynski, also known as the Unabomber. Two healthcare-related books are on his read tab from 2022, including “Crooked: Outwitting the Back Pain Industry and Getting on the Road to Recovery” and “Back Mechanic.”
The background image on his X account shows an X-ray of a spine with hardware in it, reflective of previous surgery. It is not known if this is an X-ray of Mangione’s spine. Mangione’s X account reposted the quote, “It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society,” by J. Krishnamurti at least twice, most recently in January 2024.
Luigi was an Ivy League Student
Mangione graduated in 2016 from the Gilman School, an all-boys private school in Baltimore, according to his LinkedIn account. He was valedictorian for achieving the highest cumulative GPA over four years, according to his LinkedIn page. He captained the Gilman robotics team and also received a scholarship prize in 2014.
According to his LinkedIn account, Mangione worked as a data engineer at the car-buying website TrueCar. But a company spokesperson told CBS News that Mangione hasn’t worked there since 2023.
Mangione graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 2020, a Penn spokesperson confirmed to CBS News. He received a Master of Science in engineering with a major in computer and information science, and a Bachelor of Science in engineering, majoring in computer science with a minor in mathematics, the spokesperson confirmed.
While at Penn, he worked as a teaching assistant and founded a video game development club, according to his LinkedIn account. At Stanford University in California, Mangione was a head counselor for a pre-collegiate studies program during the summer of 2019, the university said in a statement to CBS News.
He’s related to a prominent Maryland family
Mangione 26, was born and raised in Maryland. He is related to a prominent Maryland family that owns country clubs, healthcare facilities, and real estate companies. He is also a cousin of Nino Mangione who is a Maryland state Delegate and represents parts of Baltimore County.
His family released a statement on Monday saying,
“Unfortunately, we cannot comment on news reports regarding Luigi Mangione. We only know what we have read in the media. Our family is shocked and devastated by Luigi’s arrest. We offer our prayers to the family of Brian Thompson and we ask people to pray for all involved. We are devastated by this news.”
