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Police arrested a 26-year-old man 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 he 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.

A police criminal complaint charged him with forgery, carrying firearms without a license, tampering with records or identification, possessing an instrument of crime and providing false identification to law enforcement.

He has not been charged in Thompson’s death at this time.

“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.

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.

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 graduated in 2016 as valedictorian from Gilman School, an all-boys high school in Baltimore, Maryland. He went on to the University of Pennsylvania, a spokesperson confirmed, and received a bachelor of science in engineering degree in May 2020, and also a master of science engineering degree. His focus was computer science and math.

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 had no known prior arrests in the country. 

Investigators said they were aware of online posts that may have been created by Mangione about Ted Kaczynski, the domestic terrorist known as the Unabomber. The posts on GoodReads were being scoured, including ones mentioning Kaczynski, to see if any clues could be gleaned from the posts or it helps them find more information about Mangione.

Mangione was being held in Pennsylvania on gun charges and will eventually be extradited to New York to face charges in connection with Thompson’s death.

Former classmate of Mangione says ‘he had everything going for him’

Freddie Leatherbury hasn’t spoken to Mangione since they graduated in 2016 from Gilman School in Maryland. He said Mangione was a smart, friendly and athletic student who came from a wealthy family, even by the private school’s standards.

“Quite honestly, he had everything going for him,” Leatherbury said.

Leatherbury said he was stunned when a friend shared the news of their former classmate’s arrest.

“He does not seem like the kind of guy to do this based on everything I’d known about him in high school,” Leatherbury said.

Mangione comes from a prominent Maryland family

One of his cousins is Republican Maryland state legislator Nino Mangione, a spokesperson for the delegate’s office confirmed Monday.

Luigi Mangione is one of 37 grandchildren of Nick Mangione Sr., according to a 2008 obituary.

Mangione Sr. grew up poor in Baltimore’s Little Italy and rose after his World War II naval service to become a millionaire real estate developer and philanthropist, according to a 1995 profile by the Baltimore Sun. He and his wife Mary Cuba Mangione, who died in 2023, directed their philanthropy through the Mangione Family Foundation, according to a statement from Loyola University commemorating her death. They donated to a variety of causes, ranging from Catholic organizations to higher education to the arts.

A man who answered the door to the office of the Mangione Family Foundation declined to comment Monday evening.

Mangione Sr. was known for Turf Valley Resort, a sprawling luxury retreat and conference center outside Baltimore that he purchased in 1978. The father of 10 children, Nick Mangione Sr. prepared his five sons — including Luigi Mangione’s father, Louis Mangione — to help manage the family business, according to a 2003 Washington Post report.

The Mangione family also purchased Hayfields Country Club north of Baltimore in 1986. On Monday afternoon, Baltimore County police officers had blocked off an entrance to the property, which public records link to Luigi Mangione’s parents. A swarm of reporters and photographers gathered outside the entrance.

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.