Suspect in CEO’s killing hires high-profile attorney as official indicates extradition fight may stop
By Dalia Faheid, Kaitlan Collins, Rebekah Riess, Kara Scannell and Chris Boyette, CNN
(CNN) — A man accused of killing UnitedHealthcare’s CEO in Manhattan has retained a high-profile New York attorney – a development revealed on the same day an official indicated the defendant may soon stop fighting extradition from Pennsylvania, the site of his arrest, to the Empire State.
Luigi Mangione, charged in New York with second-degree murder in the December 4 shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, has retained Karen Friedman Agnifilo – a former Manhattan prosecutor – to represent him, CNN learned Friday.
Working in private practice since 2021, Friedman Agnifilo had served under then-DA Cyrus Vance Jr. for seven years as chief assistant district attorney in Manhattan, the same jurisdiction prosecuting her new client. Friedman Agnifilo, who also previously served as a CNN legal analyst, declined to comment Friday.
Mangione, 26, was arrested Monday at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania, after police were alerted he looked like the man New York investigators alleged gunned down Thompson five days earlier as Thompson walked toward a Manhattan hotel hosting his company’s investors’ conference, authorities said. The suspect appeared to be driven by anger against the health insurance industry and against “corporate greed” as a whole, according to an NYPD intelligence report obtained Tuesday by CNN.
An attorney for Mangione in Pennsylvania has denied his client’s involvement in the killing in New York and said he anticipates Mangione will plead not guilty there to the murder charge and other counts. The attorney, Thomas Dickey, also said Tuesday his client was fighting extradition to New York – a process with the potential to last for weeks.
But on Friday, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said he’s seen signs Mangione could soon waive his right to fight extradition.
“Indications are that the defendant may waive, but that waiver is not complete until a court proceeding, which my understanding from court officials in Pennsylvania cannot happen until Tuesday,” Bragg said. “So until that time, we’re going to continue to press forward on parallel paths and we’ll be ready whether he is going to waive extradition or whether he’s going to contest extradition.”
Mangione is in custody on Pennsylvania charges related to a gun and fake ID police say they found when they arrested him in Altoona. He also plans to plead not guilty to the Pennsylvania charges, Dickey has said. Mangione was denied bail at an extradition hearing Tuesday afternoon at Pennsylvania’s Blair County Courthouse.
CNN has sought comment from Dickey about whether he and his client have changed their position on extradition.
Since Mangione’s arrest, authorities have indicated he is facing mounting evidence in the killing of Thompson, a husband and father of two. A 3D-printed gun authorities allege Mangione had when he was arrested matches three shell casings found at the crime scene, and his fingerprints match those found on items near the scene, New York City’s police commissioner has said.
Authorities have pointed to other items which may point to a motive. Investigators found a three-page handwritten “claim of responsibility” and writings in a spiral notebook, a law enforcement source briefed on the matter told CNN. Also, three 9 mm shell casings from the crime scene had the words “delay,” “deny” and “depose” written across them, NYPD’s Chief Detective Joseph Kenny has said. The words are similar to a title of a 2010 book critiquing the insurance industry.
Thompson’s killing has laid bare many Americans’ fury toward the health care industry, with Mangione garnering sympathy online and offers to pay his legal bills. It’s also struck fear in C-suites across the country, as the NYPD intelligence report obtained by CNN warns online rhetoric could “signal an elevated threat facing executives in the near-term.”
Mangione – the privileged scion of a well-to-do family, high school valedictorian and Ivy League graduate – vanished from view of his loved ones in recent months, only to emerge as a suspect in a high-profile killing.
New York prosecutors charged Mangione with one count of murder, two counts of second-degree criminal possession of a weapon, one count of second-degree possession of a forged document, and one count of third-degree criminal possession of a weapon, online court documents show. The presentation of evidence to a grand jury is the next procedural step in obtaining an indictment.
If convicted of second-degree murder in New York, Mangione would face 15 years to life in prison.
As for Friedman Agnifilo, Mangione’s new attorney, one longtime New York prosecutor told CNN she has “as much experience as any human being, especially in the state court.”
“She knows every corridor, every judge, every clerk in the courthouse,” the source told CNN about Friedman Agnifilo.
FBI: San Francisco police recognized suspect
On Friday, the FBI told CNN they received a tip from the San Francisco Police Department, saying an officer with the department’s Special Victims Unit had recognized Mangione as a possible suspect on December 5 after seeing the surveillance photos of the suspect’s unmasked face.
The San Francisco Chronicle first reported on the tip Thursday.
Chronicle reporter Megan Cassidy told CNN’s John Berman her team reported “a few days ago” on the existence of a missing persons report in San Francisco for Mangione.
“Apparently, there was somebody at SFPD that was looking into the missing persons case, and after the shooting of Brian Thompson, recognized this person and called in this tip, or emailed this tip, to the FBI,” Cassidy said.
The FBI then sent the tip to New York investigators during the manhunt, the agency told CNN.
CNN Chief Law Enforcement and Intelligence Analyst John Miller explained on Friday’s “AC360” how the tip ultimately made its way to the FBI in New York and the NYPD.
“This tip comes from, I think, a victim witness specialist in the San Francisco Police Department who had that missing persons case somewhere in front of them and looked at that face and says, ‘Gee, that could be the guy that is on these FBI posters all over town,’ so SFPD sends that to San Francisco FBI,” Miller said.
“San Francisco FBI says, ‘that’s a New York office case,’” he added.
Miller explained the FBI’s New York office likely sent the information to a violent crimes squad composed of a mix of FBI agents and NYPD officers.
“They look at it and they do a workup on the name, checking, you know, any indicators that guy’s been in New York, and then they send it over to NYPD,” Miller said.
By Sunday, the tip joined 200 viable leads being examined by authorities, according to Miller.
“Then Monday morning, at 9:15 in the McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania, another tip leads to the capture,” he said. “So you see, these leads are piling up, being tasked out and being worked, and this was in that pile coming up because it was a viable lead. It’s just that destiny took a hand quicker.”
Mangione was not insured by UnitedHealthcare, company says
While police say he identified UnitedHealthcare as one of the largest corporations in America in his writings, neither Mangione nor his mother were UnitedHealthcare members, a UnitedHealth Group spokesperson said Thursday.
The suspect appeared to be driven by anger against the health insurance industry and against “corporate greed” as a whole, according to the NYPD intelligence report obtained Tuesday by CNN.
“He appeared to view the targeted killing of the company’s highest-ranking representative as a symbolic takedown and a direct challenge to its alleged corruption and ‘power games,’ asserting in his note he is the ‘first to face it with such brutal honesty,’” says the NYPD assessment, which was based on Mangione’s writings and social media.
Mangione knew UnitedHealthcare was holding an investors’ conference around the time Thompson was shot and killed – and mentioned in writings he would be going to the conference site, NYPD’s Kenny told Fox News on Tuesday. In a notebook passage, he mused what could be better than “to kill the CEO at his own bean counting conference,” a law enforcement official briefed on the matter told CNN.
In some of his writings, Mangione referenced pain from a back injury he got in July 2023, Kenny said. Investigators are looking into an insurance claim for the injury.
“Some of the writings that he had, he was discussing the difficulty of sustaining that injury,” Kenny said. “So, we’re looking into whether or not the insurance industry either denied a claim from him or didn’t help him out to the fullest extent.”
As he entered a Pennsylvania courthouse Tuesday afternoon, shackled at the hands and feet and wearing an orange prison jumpsuit with DOC emblazoned on the back, Mangione yelled, in part, “It’s completely out of touch and an insult to the intelligence of the American people. It’s lived experience.”
Copycats likely to ‘feel emboldened,’ security analysts warn
A report released Saturday from the Center for Internet Security said there is “widespread support” of Thompson’s killing with encouragement for copycats and jokes related to the shooting proliferating across social media. The report said the online discourse would likely leave those with intentions to commit similar violent acts “emboldened and encouraged.”
“The healthcare industry is highly likely to face an ongoing increased threat landscape, including targeted acts of violence. This risk extends to non-healthcare sector executives as well, with many users indicating they view (the shooter’s) actions as the start of a movement against corporate America as a whole,” the Center for Internet Security, a partially federally funded nonprofit focused on cybersecurity, said in the threat intelligence report.
According to the center, its analysts have noted “hostile references” to most of the major health care providers including Humana, The Cigna Group, Kaiser Permanente, Aetna, Blue Cross Blue Shield and CVS Health. The report focused on a trend of online posts describing CEOs having a “target” on their back or similar language and mentioning other health care companies as possible future targets.
“Users expressed their belief that the assassination proved violent action is an effective means of protest … Posts often included calls for more direct actions targeting executives or statements indicating they believe causing executives to be fearful will lead to desired policy changes,” the report said.
Physical “wanted posters” and online lists featuring names and photos of health care executives have appeared and been shared online, even prompting a New York City Police Department Bulletin, according to the report.
“Although some of these posts did not explicitly call for violence, given the context of the current threat environment, the intention for these lists to serve as hit lists is implied and comments on implicit posts includes violent rhetoric,” the center said.
“Since the public response to the shooting has been (overwhelmingly) supportive, individuals seeking to replicate Mangione’s activities will likely feel emboldened and encouraged,” the report said.
The center’s report warned that law enforcement and other officials involved in Mangione’s arrest and prosecution may also be considered valid targets and predicted courthouses during his trial may receive bomb threats and see demonstrations in support of the suspect.
Search warrants executed in New York
Dickey, who is representing Mangione in his Pennsylvania case, has said he wants to see the ballistics and fingerprint evidence for himself.
“Those two sciences, in and of themselves, have come under some criticism in the past, relative to their credibility, their truthfulness, their accuracy, however you want to do it,” Dickey said on CNN’s “Erin Burnett OutFront” Wednesday evening.
Authorities have executed as many as three search warrants in New York as part of their investigation, sources tell CNN.
At least two of the warrants include a backpack found in Central Park and a burner phone found along the getaway route Mangione is believed to have taken from the shooting scene, a law enforcement source with knowledge of the investigation confirms.
Peter Dering, the founder and CEO of Peak Design, the manufacturer of the backpack, said the company has received threats in the wake of rumors investigators used the bag to track down and arrest Mangione.
“Peak Design has not provided customer information to the police and would only do so under the order of a subpoena,” Dering said in a statement. “We take our customer privacy seriously. There is misinformation being shared on social media that has triggered many serious threats for the safety of not only me, but our employees as well.”
Investigators also searched a New York hostel where authorities allege Mangione stayed the night before the shooting, and the hotel room where Thompson was staying while in New York.
The handwritten document authorities allege was found on Mangione indicated “ill will towards corporate America,” Kenny said Tuesday. Separate notes in a spiral notebook allegedly found on Mangione included to-do lists to facilitate a killing and references to the Unabomber, a law enforcement source briefed on the matter told CNN.
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CNN’s Jason Hanna, Karina Tsui, Steve Almasy, Andy Rose, Brynn Gingras, Michelle Watson, Bonney Kapp, Dakin Andone, Emma Tucker, Meg Tirrell and Jason Carroll contributed to this report.
