What we know about Luigi Mangione, Ivy League grad and suspect in UnitedHealthcare CEO’s murder

NEW YORK — A University of Pennsylvania graduate is in custody following the targeted attack of Brian Thompson, the CEO of major insurance group UnitedHealthcare who was fatally shot outside a Midtown Manhattan hotel ahead of an investor conference, police said Monday.

Luigi Mangione is a suspect in the fatal shooting, authorities confirmed Monday night during a press briefing in Altoona, Pennsylvania, where he was apprehended after an individual at a McDonald’s recognized him from the wildly circulated images of the suspect sought in the shooting.

Here’s what we know:

Mangione faces 5 charges in Pennsylvania

Mangione has been charged with five crimes, including carrying a gun without a license, forgery, falsely identifying himself to authorities and possessing “instruments of crime,” according to a newly released criminal complaint.

Mangione, 26, was initially identified as a “strong” person of interest in the shooting death after he was apprehended at the McDonald’s, New York City Mayor Eric Adams said during a press briefing in New York on Monday.

Charges could be filed against Mangione in the homicide as early as Monday or Tuesday, authorities said. Investigators are working to determine whether anyone else was involved in Thompson’s death.

Mangione was eating at the McDonald’s Monday morning when an individual thought he looked suspiciously like the shooting suspect and alerted an employee, who called police, authorities said.

RELATED: UnitedHealthcare CEO shooting suspect’s timeline before, during, after the shooting

He was carrying a firearm and suppressor “both consistent with the weapon used in the murder,” NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch said during the press briefing earlier Monday. The gun “may have been made on a 3D printer,” police said.

He also had “multiple fraudulent IDs,” including a fake New Jersey ID matching the ID the suspect used to check into his New York City hostel before the shooting incident, Tisch said. He was carrying a U.S. passport that identified him as Luigi Mangione, police said.

Police also recovered clothing, including a mask consistent with those worn by the wanted individual, as well as a three-page “handwritten document that speaks to both his motivation and mindset,” she said.

Mangione was arrested on unrelated charges Monday, police said. He was in possession of a ghost gun capable of firing a 9mm round and will face gun charges in Altoona, NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny told reporters during the briefing earlier Monday.

He has been charged in Pennsylvania with five crimes, including carrying a gun without a license, forgery, falsely identifying himself to authorities and possessing “instruments of crime,” according to a newly released criminal complaint.

The charging document alleges that Mangione lied about his identity to police and carried the ghost gun without a license.

When Altoona police asked him if he had ever been to New York City, Mangione started shaking, according to the charging document. He didn’t answer the question directly, police said.

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro said Mangione was traveling between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh with stops in between, including in Altoona.

Police said they are working to develop a full sense of his timeline in Pennsylvania and how long he has been in Altoona.

The NYPD sent detectives to Altoona to interview him and are going through the recovered writings and his social media, police said.

“It does seem that he had some ill will toward corporate America,” Kenny said.

A Goodreads account that appears to belong to Mangione left a four-star review on Ted Kaczynski’s “Industrial Society and Its Future” — more commonly known as the “Unabomber manifesto” — and described Kaczynski as “a violent individual — rightfully imprisoned — who maimed innocent people. While these actions tend to be characterized as those of a crazy Luddite, however, they are more accurately seen as those of an extreme political revolutionary.”

A source confirmed to News that the Goodreads account is part of the law enforcement investigation.

Mangione has ties to San Francisco and his last known address was in Honolulu, Kenny said. In November 2023, Mangione was arrested in Honolulu for trespassing in a Hawaii State Park, court records show. He pleaded no contest and was ordered to pay a $100 fine.

He has no prior arrest history in New York, Kenny said.

Mangione was born and raised in Maryland, Kenny said. He is a 2016 graduate of the Gilman School, a private high school in Baltimore, where he was the valedictorian of his graduating class, according to the school’s website. The school said in a statement that Mangione’s “suspected involvement in this case is deeply distressing news on top of an already awful situation.”

“Our hearts go out to everyone affected. Here on campus, our focus will remain on caring for and educating our students,” the statement continued.

Mangione is a May 2020 graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, according to a school spokesperson. He studied computer science and earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in engineering from the Ivy League institution.

Following his graduation, Mangione worked as a data engineer at online car marketplace TrueCar, Inc. beginning in November 2020, according to a LinkedIn account that appears to belong to Mangione.

A representative for TrueCar said that Mangione stopped working for TrueCar in 2023.

Minjun Kim, a classmate who graduated from Gilman with Mangione, told News that “he is the last person I expected to be involved in something like this.”

“He was an incredibly intelligent, humble and kind person,” Kim said. “He seemed like a very bright guy with a bright future.”

About six months ago, Kim said he was notified by other classmates that Mangione’s family was “inquiring about his whereabouts.”

“I didn’t hear anything about him until today when all the news dropped,” Kim said. “It really sucks for his family, who must be going through it right now.”

New photos released

NYPD officials released new images this weekend of the suspect being sought in the shooting in the back of a taxi, where he could be seen peering through the open slider in the partition between the seats.

Backpack contained Monopoly money

Police found a backpack believed to belong to the suspected shooter in Central Park on Friday evening, police sources told News. The backpack contained fake money from the game Monopoly and a Tommy Hilfiger jacket, sources said.

The backpack was found after NYPD deployed an army of officers and drones to conduct a grid search, police sources said earlier.

As of Saturday, three days after the shooting, sources close to the investigation told News the New York Police Department is making progress toward identifying the gunman but, as of now, still has not done so.

On Friday, police said they believed the gunman left New York City following the shooting — ditching his bike on the Upper West Side and taking a taxi to a Port Authority bus facility at 178th Street. Police said they believe he boarded a bus there because they did not see him on video leaving the facility.

Suspect stayed at hostel

The NYPD released on Thursday new photos of the suspect, seen without a mask, while asking for the public’s help in identifying him. The images were taken from a surveillance camera at the HI New York City Hostel on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. Police had obtained a warrant to search after coming to believe the suspect stayed there, sources told News.

Police were able to find an image of the suspect without his face mask because he was flirting with the woman who checked him into the hostel, police sources told News.

As he stood at the check-in desk, the sources said the woman asked to see his smile. The suspected shooter obliged, pulling down his mask long enough for the surveillance camera to capture his face.

It appears the suspect shared a room with two other men, according to police sources.

The suspect likely checked into the hostel on Nov. 24, checked out and then checked back in again on Nov. 30, according to sources. It’s not clear when the surveillance image was captured.

The suspected shooter checked into the hostel using a New Jersey license that wasn’t his own, according to police sources. Detectives ran the name and found it did not resemble any known photos of the suspect or other evidence amassed so far, the sources said.

Suspect arrived in NYC 10 days before shooting: Sources

The suspect came to New York City on Nov. 24 on a Greyhound bus, when a surveillance camera at Port Authority Bus Terminal caught his arrival at 9 p.m., law enforcement sources told News.

The inbound bus originated in Atlanta but it was not immediately clear where the suspect boarded. The sources said he was spotted on board in Washington, D.C., so he boarded there or somewhere between D.C. and Atlanta.

Both Greyhound and the parent company of the hostel, Hostelling International USA, said in a statement that they are “fully cooperating with the NYPD” but cannot comment further due to the active investigation.

The 10-day period has been the focus of investigative efforts. Police have collected a lot of video of the suspect all over the city — in the subway, in cabs, in a McDonald’s, according to sources. Each place he paid with cash and he made sure to keep his mask on, according to sources.

Whereabouts day of the shooting

Police have released photos of the suspect in a mask, captured at a Starbucks near the hotel before the shooting, according to New York station W. He was described by police as wearing a light brown or cream-colored jacket, a black face mask, black and white sneakers and a “very distinctive” gray backpack.

Sources told News the suspected shooter was also seen on video much earlier, at 5 a.m. the day of the shooting, near the hostel carrying what appears to be an e-bike battery.

New cleared CCTV video shows a man who appears to be the suspect walking west on 55th Street at 6:19 a.m. The video shows him stoop down as he appears to momentarily drop an object on the garbage before continuing to walk.

Writing discovered on shell casings

Detectives later discovered writing on the shell casings found at the scene where Thompson was gunned down, police sources told News.

Detectives were working to determine whether the words were meant as a message from the shooter and a hint at his motive.

Written on the shell casings were the words “deny,” “defend” and “depose,” according to sources.

Other evidence: cellphone, water bottle, candy wrapper

After the shooting, the suspect fled on foot into an alley, where a phone was recovered, according to Kenny. He then fled on an e-bike and he was last seen riding into Central Park at 6:48 a.m., police said.

Police released photos of the suspect holding a firearm and on a bike.

Detectives have also retrieved a water bottle and candy wrapper from the area where he was apparently waiting, law enforcement sources said. After analysis, NYPD investigators believe the cellphone, candy wrapper and water bottle are linked to the shooter, police sources said.

Investigators believe they were able to score DNA samples from several pieces of the evidence, law enforcement sources told News on Friday. The samples are currently at the NYC Office of the Chief Medical Examiner to be run through databases for a possible match, the sources said. That process could take a couple days.

At the same time, NYPD detectives are working with the U.S. Marshals Service to try and track down the shooter along with the FBI, which has the most sophisticated technology for retrieving usable data from cellphones, sources said.

Professional killer appears unlikely

The victim’s hotel room has already been accessed by investigators, whose top priority is determining Thompson’s most recent conversations and movements, sources said.

The working theory among detectives right now is that the shooting was carried out by someone who is not a professional killer because too many “mistakes” were made, sources said. Hitmen typically don’t carry cell phones to their hits and the shots were fired from a distance that would be considered “too far” away from the victim, the sources said.

Another photo appeared to show the man walking by the window of a cab.

At this point, detectives are trying to determine whether Thompson was targeted because of some type of personal conflict or as a result of his work as an insurance executive, sources said. The killer apparently had some knowledge of Thompson’s schedule on Wednesday and the fact that he would be arriving at the Hilton well before the company meeting was to begin, the sources said.

Police are interviewing Thompson’s colleagues and family about any potential specific threats, Kenny said.

What we know about the victim

Thompson, 50, was in New York City for the UnitedHealthcare investors conference, which was scheduled to start at 8 a.m. The conference was being held at the Hilton outside of which he was shot, but he was not staying there, police said.

UnitedHealthcare’s parent company, UnitedHealth Group, the largest health insurer in the world, said in a statement, “We are deeply saddened and shocked at the passing of our dear friend and colleague Brian Thompson.”

“Brian was a highly respected colleague and friend to all who worked with him,” the company said. “We are working closely with the New York Police Department and ask for your patience and understanding during this difficult time. Our hearts go out to Brian’s family and all who were close to him.”

Police and the FBI urge the public to call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-577-TIPS or 1-800-CALL-FBI with any information. A $50,000 reward is being offered for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the person responsible.