Newly unsealed body-worn camera footage shows the moment Luigi Mangione is approached by two patrol officers shortly before he is arrested exactly one year ago today, on December 9, 2024, at a McDonald’s outside Altoona in the environs of Blair County Pennsylvania, where he was eating a steak sandwich and hash browns for breakfast. The video shows Mr. Mangione handing the officer his ID, which would turn out to be fake. The video also contains audio of Mr. Mangione speaking.

A customer had alerted the McDonald’s manager that Mr. Mangione, who was wearing a beanie, a hooded jacket, and a surgical mask, and was sitting in a corner of the restaurant, resembled the suspect wanted for the shooting in New York. Five days earlier, the CEO of UnitedHealthcare Brian Thompson had been gunned down on a midtown Manhattan street as he was on his way to an annual investor conference. Thompson died at the hospital about thirty minutes later, while the killer fled, triggering a nationwide manhunt. 

The unsealed footage is taken from Altoona’s patrol officer Tyler Frye’s body camera, who testified last Thursday for the pretrial suppression hearings, currently underway at Manhattan criminal court, as the Sun reported.   

The video begins in the car, as Officer Fry and officer Joseph Detwiler, who also testified, arrive at the McDonald’s at about 9:21am. Officer Detwiler can be seen entering the McDonal’s, going to the back, where he walks past Mr. Mangione towards the bathroom, to see what the suspicious person would do, as he testified. He then turns around and approaches Mr. Mangione at the table, asks him to lower his mask and to provide identification. 

In the video, Mr. Mangione can be heard calmly telling the officer his name is “Mark Rosario,” apologizing for looking suspicious, and saying he’s from New Jersey.

Mr. Mangione is then seen handing the officers a New Jersey driver’s license, which later turned out to be fake. The video ends with the officer holding the fake license into the camera.  

More law enforcement personnel began to arrive until a total of thirteen local officers gathered at the McDonald’s. Mr. Mangione was eventually detained, handcuffed, frisked, and finally taken into custody and brought to the police precinct.   

One of those officers was Mr. Fox, who has been with Altoona police department for seven years, after serving in the Marines for eight years, and who testified on Tuesday. 

Like the three previous arresting officers, who testified at the suppression hearings, which started last week, Officer Fox had heard about the shooting on Fox News, and seen images released by the New York police department to the media of the suspected shooter, who had not been caught and whose murder weapon was still at large. 

When cross-examined by the defense and asked how many times the officer had seen images of the suspect, patrolman Fox said, “I saw it daily. It was all over Fox News.” He further remarked that Fox News was the “only” outlet “that was putting out his picture… The other outlets were essentially justifying his actions.” 

Officer Fox described Thompson’s killing as an “assasination” and told an assistant district attorney, Joel Seidemann, that it was a “violent act of cowardice that targeted a defenseless human being.”     

He was aware of the fact, he testified, that the shooter “was able to flee the scene without a firearm recovered.” 

Officer Fox said that he was on patrol the morning of December 9 with his canine Blue, but with no human partner. He heard the 911 call come in that there was a suspicious person at the McDonal’s, who resembled the suspected shooter from New York, and that Office Detweiler responded to the call. 

“Initially when the call first came over,” Officer Fox testified. “I chuckled and I didn’t believe it and continued doing paper work. But when I heard that there was no response to the name on the ID, I started going over there.”  

The officer, who had voluntarily headed over to the McDonald’s, ended up being one who would eventually read Mr. Mangione his Miranda warnings about twenty minutes after officers had been questioning him. He also searched his backpack together with patrolwoman Christy Wasser, as the Sun reported, where Officer Wasser found a loaded magazine wrapped inside a pair of damp gray underpants, and later that day, escorted Mr. Mangione to a Blair County, Pennsylvania courthouse for his arraignment. 

“There was media there, about half as many as here today,” Officer Fox said on Tuesday, referring to the media presence that had assembled at Blair County Courthouse. “At the end,” the officer said, meaning after the arraignment was finished, the defendant, Mr. Mangione allegedly said, “All these people here for a mass murderer, wild.” 

Officer Fox recalled that he stumbled over Mr. Mangione, whose feet were shackled, and that he apologized to him. “I am sorry. I forgot you are shackled,” Officer Fox testified that he told Mr. Mangione, who allegedly responded, “It’s ok. I am gonna have to get used to it.”   

Mr. Mangione faces charges in three separate jurisdictions for crimes related to Thompson’s murder: In Pennsylvania state court, in New York State and at the Southern District of New York, where federal prosecutors are seeking the death penalty. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges. 

The suppression hearings will pause on Wednesday and resume on Thursday.