Moments after Luigi Mangione was handcuffed at a Pennsylvania McDonald’s, a police officer searching his backpack found a loaded gun magazine wrapped in a pair of underwear.
The discovery, recounted in court Monday as Mangione fights to keep evidence out of his New York murder case, convinced police in Altoona, Pennsylvania, that he was the man wanted in the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in Manhattan five days earlier.
The only useful outcome is acquittal. These rich board room types need to know they’re not safe.
Luigi wasn’t there he was with me, we were picking blueberries in the woods.
This is true.
Source: I’m Luigi.
Waluigi did it, why has no one come up with that?
No, I am Luigi!
I’m Luigi and so is my wife!
We’re all Luigi on this blessed day
Yep. Every Wednesday.
I’m Spartacus. I mean, I’m Luigi!
Carrying around bullets = murderer?
It America of all places!
Is it not legal to carry bullets any more?
No way to know if those bullets and other objects on the bag were there or were planted by the cops.
Why go through the trouble of makkng a “ghost gun” if you’re going to keep stuff like this? It doesn’t really make sense.
Exactly. The whole point of a ghost gun is that it’s untraceable. You made it yourself; they can’t track it so some purchase record. The way you use a ghost gun is you make it, use it, and then just leave it at the crime scene. You make sure you never touch the thing with bare hands, so there are no prints on it. If you made one ghost gun, you can make another. They’re easily replaceable. No need to keep it with you after the crime.
Speak for yourself. Ghost guns are just guns without the paperwork, I own and shoot both regularly in a lawful manner.
$6 in plastic and $150 for a used part kit is dope.
Dude was well off. 150 is nothing to him.
My point was ghost guns shouldn’t directly be associated with criminal activity. Normal everyday people use them for lawful purposes too. I have a few since they are cheap and fun to make.
I mean, after 2023 its actually is illegal to own a ghost gun. So lawful citizens won’t be making one and anyone making a ghost gun is automatically a criminal because of the criminal activity.
And why would you bring it with you on your trip to fucking McDonald’s? Like who’s brining their ghost gun evidence of a week old crime, and their poorly spelled copaganda manifesto, when grabbing lunch?
Just forgot it was in his bag? The bag that was illegally searched on site but no weapon was found until after an 11 min camera blackout and a trip to the station…
also having monopoly money? and an extra backpack found mysteriously somewhere else? or the fact they were came extremely quickly to that mcdonalds.
This. They didn’t find the gun or the manifesto until after the bag was taken to the station. Haven’t seen the bodycam video, but cops carry 9mm pistols, so it would be incredibly easy for them to plant a mag during his being detained. A gun would be easy to plant once at the station, where they also just happened to ‘find’ his ‘manifesto’.
My hunch is that the shooter, whoever it was, dumped the gun, silencer, and manifesto somewhere and the cops found it. When they decided they had the shooter in custody, they ‘found’ the evidence in his possession.
Doubtful, the manifesto was full of cop dicksucking and tied off any possible loose ends perfectly.
It was a cops fanfic manifesto they are claiming is legit.
cops carry 9mm pistols, so it would be incredibly easy for them to plant a mag during his being detained
Assuming he carries the same gun as them I guess. Mags aren’t universal.
loaded gun magazine
Odd way to say loaded gun or magazine.
Eeh, overly precise sure but not particularly egregious.
I said odd not egregious.
Yes? I didn’t contradict your calling it “odd”, I clarified that it isn’t egregiously odd, just the regular kind.
My misunderstanding.
Bullets, a gun, $20,000 cash, the same outfit, the files on his computer where he designed and printed the gun mod used to shoot brian thompson, a history of book reviews where he says protests are not enough including one review of the book Deny Delay Defend which mirrors the words carved on the bullet casings at the murder scene of Brian Thompson, and the fact that he was travelling discreetly by bus across multiple states despite having a cushy six figure tech job and being the direct heir to the Mangione small fortune.
We all know he did it.
His rights were violated when he was arrested. Full stop. A string of coincidences and atypical behavior does not a murderer make
I’m so torn by this one… assuming he did it, if it wasn’t about killing the very assuming asshole that got shot, he should not get free because of a technicality. I mean if it was another rando that committed a crime against a lambda not one would cheer about a criminal escaping justice due to a technicality. Or so I hope. But since the guy who was shot down was feasting on misery it’s a very tempting thing to wish for. Personally I would rather that we got the jury thingy where they all agree that no crime was committed instead or something along those lines I don’t remember the specifics about nullification.
Jury nullification isn’t that they agreed crime wasn’t committed, but rather that they refuse to agree on a guilty verdict because they don’t agree with the law. It’s sort of a natural loophole in jury responsibility and enforcement.
See that’s kind of the trap you fall into with it. People treat jury nullification as a third option, but at the end of the day they give the verdict “not guilty” in those exact words despite how they feel about him doing the crime. If they announce “guilty but we don’t mind it” then the verdict is going to be guilty and the judge will be in charge of sentencing.
Right, it’s not really a 3rd option. It’s more like a negative value option. It exists, but it’s not really in the options list. It’s closer to “the only winning move is not to play”
That “technicality” is a critical part of our criminal justice system. I’d much rather a criminal be set free than set the precedent that due process is optional
Allowing exceptions here would open the door to all sorts of corruption. What would then stop the president from treating all his political opponents the same way? Have them all raided without cause and “find” all sorts of evidence
By the way, the jury thing is jury nullification. The basic concept is that if a juror feels a law is unjust (or any other reason), they can vote not to convict even if the burden of proof was met for a conviction. The courts can’t tell the jury their verdict is incorrect. The only recourse is an appeal (which can’t happen in an acquittal due to double jeopardy)
Jury nullification was used quite a bit in the North before the Civil War. Many Northern juries chose to acquit violations of the Fugitive Slave Act because they felt the law was unjust
Exactly. In the past few decades there have been many examples of falsely accused prisoners being exonerated by new evidence or corrupt convictions. Not to mention those that were executed before they could be found innocent.
That’s why it’s crucial that we hold our justice system to the highest standard. Not only because we want to find the perpetrator, but to ensure that we’re not convicting an innocent person. If the price of that is a few criminals get to escape justice, so be it.
Let’s say that the most generous past examples are followed and the evidence found on his person and statements he made following his arrests are off the table as evidence. There is still his history, lack of alibi, clothing, and the gun mod he printed. He’s still guilty.
I think the “risks” of letting a potential killer go free are reduced if the chances of any sort of repeat crime are distant.
I remember a sitcom spy-hero type show had a dilemma like this. A bad guy offers the good guys a large sum of money they can use to help unfortunate people he victimized, in exchange for them leaving him alone. He’s retired, has no plans, or even means, to continue any horrible acts, so it’s entirely down to whether they seek retribution for the bad stuff he’s done rather than use the opportunity to help and protect people.
But since the guy who was shot down was feasting on misery it’s a very tempting thing to wish for.
Personally, I’d say there’s another layer to it. You touched on it earlier, but consider also the risk this man poses to your average member of society. To do that, assuming he did it, you need to consider his motives—which is protest, at the core of it. There’s who the victim was, absolutely, but there’s also his motive. Based on the context we have, I don’t see him as a threat.
I don’t know shit. I’m just a guy on the internet, and this is exactly why there is a justice system and not mob rule. It could be likely, it could be circumstancial. Let it play out, facts on the table and let his peers judge him for the crime he is alleged to have committed.
Pointing a finger from random anecdotes you’ve heard/seen or hearsay, or even potentially malicious prosecutors looking for a scapegoat and not actual answers. This could as likely be an inside job/false flag to stir the pot as it being a lone wolf with an agenda.
Show me the receipts, then we can talk about it.
But here’s what doesn’t make sense to me. The guy is fucking smart, smart enough that he can literally shoot someone in broad daylight and escape the city. And then he turns up in a fucking McDonald’s with a backpack full of evidence. Those two things do not jive together. If he was that smart, the gun (or more specifically, all the parts that make up the gun disassembled) and everything else he had with him, including clothing would be in random trash cans and dumpsters all over the state by the time they caught him. Or burned. You aren’t smart enough to evade the entire American law enforcement apparatus for over a day, while also being dumb enough to walk around in public with a slam dunk conviction in your bag. Unless you want to be caught.
Point is, the whole thing stinks a bit to me.
Everyone has to eat, travel can be very exhausting.
I wouldn’t really call him smart.
I’m not saying he’s dumb for eating. I’m saying he’s dumb for walking around days later with a ‘convict me kit’ on his back. That’s what doesn’t make sense to me.
Well he was fleeing the entire time. If he had a safehouse in the city or a nearby stop he would just end up trapped inside of it.
Which would have been a fantastic idea. Hang out at that place, ideally have a few weeks of groceries stocked up, so you can just hang out there and watch TV and not have to leave or be seen. Then you basically don’t leave for a few weeks, at which point a lot of the hoopla will have blown over and your surveillance photo won’t be on every TV screen.
Or if he wants more distance, get rid of the freaking evidence. Makes no sense that he would have such a good escape plan, and yet not have thought through what might happen if someone recognized him a.
Has that idea ever worked?
Well. I guess if it had then we wouldn’t hear about it.
Play it out with your mind.
Police arrest a guy who matches the picture but without the backpack full of evidence have no proof that he is the guy. After 3 days his lawyer demands they let him go. End of story.
As long as you’re making things up, why not just say he confessed? Much stronger argument
Also WTF does his job have to do with taking the bus? I work in tech and take the bus too. I’d take trains, but American trains are lacking. Better arrest me too since riding the bus is proof of murder now
Better arrest me too since riding the bus is proof of murder now
“Bitch I might!”
–American Law Enforcement
Which part are you accusing of being made up? All of it? Everything here is fake? There were no words carved into the bullet casings, he isn’t the son of the head of Mangione Enterprises, and 3D printers don’t even exist?
Careful with that nuance around here. It’s been know to hurt people.
I am going to be intentionally clumsy in this China shop.
If he didn’t do it, he needs to be set free.
If he did do it, he needs to be set free and a statue of him should be placed on the sidewalk where it happened to commemorate the event.
Cool! So where you do suppose we draw the line where people are allowed to straight up murder people on the street in cold blood because we don’t like them or what they do?
Because a WHOLE new set of laws need to be in place or this shit turns into the purge.
Why was the ceo allowed to have people murdered in cold blood by not providing treatment?
Denying treatment isn’t murder. Has no one explained to you what murder means?
Fiiiine manslaughter
It’s not that he just denied treatment. He ordered his company to deny treatment FOR COVERED ITEMS according to the insurance plan. This caused people to not get life saving care, die, and no longer be a “burden” on their bottom line. That IS murder. Premeditated.
That’s like seeing someone hanging from a ledge of a cliff because they fell and, instead of helping, they stomped on their fingers so they plunged to their death at the bottom.
The CEO was responsible for more death than his alleged killer by a several tens of thousands fold ratio.
And sadly, despite how horrific it is- at the end of the day, it is legal. He didn’t hunt these people down and end them. He denied them coverage.
This needs to change, but vigilantism clearly isn’t going to do it, and this is evident in the fact that it’s still happening. In fact, I believe it’s even worse now.
But- let’s say we bring the anger to the streets anyway, and full on gun down every CEO that we don’t like. What is stopping us from stopping at CEOs? Why not end regional managers we disagree with? Local managers? What about shift leaders?
Hell… Why even stop at our own places of work? Neighbors? Bad service providers? Anyone is a mark!
Where do we draw the line where murder isn’t okay just because we don’t like what someone does?
There is a reason we have laws in place to stop slippery slopes like this from happening. And we are better than these assholes. They got to do what they do using our system of law- so we will need to use that system of law to stop them.
Murder isn’t the way this is done. This is just how you escalate them putting the military in every city.
I don’t even necessarily disagree, but how do you say the exact name of the fallacy you are invoking without seeing the problem in what you’re saying?
There can be clear start and stop points. Why would this ever lead to regional managers as you describe? Why would it ever lead to people you simply disagree with? To argue in good faith, you need to take the point as it stands, clearly stopping at a level of someone who is “responsible for far more death.” That is the argument that the above commenter posted, and there’s not a good reason to extend that any further.
They got to do what they do using our system of law- so we will need to use that system of law to stop them.
Now, I’m going to step away from the context of homicide, but this is at a base an incredibly gullible point. Virtually every civil rights movement has been accomplished through breaking laws, called civil disobedience.
“an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law.” - MLK
And sadly, despite how horrific it is- at the end of the day, it is legal. He didn’t hunt these people down and end them. He denied them coverage. This needs to change, but vigilantism clearly isn’t going to do it, and this is evident in the fact that it’s still happening. In fact, I believe it’s even worse now.
In the aftermath of the killings, approval of claims skyrocketed. If CEOs kept getting deleted for their horrifically immoral actions, then I’ve no doubt we’d have a different healthcare system right now. Your bootlicking is exactly what they rely on to literally keep killing people. You are enabling them to kill people.
It’s a trolly car problem. If I’m confronted with this moral dilemma, I’m choosing the lever that kills the CEO to save millions of lives.
Where do we draw the line where murder isn’t okay just because we don’t like what someone does?
In this case, this person was so vile, so directly contributing to the misery of society, the slope aint slippery at all.
There is a reason we have laws in place to stop slippery slopes like this from happening. And we are better than these assholes. They got to do what they do using our system of law- so we will need to use that system of law to stop them.
The reason is that law enforcement is a tool to protect capital. The police and politicians will never step in for this issue, because they are captured by the capitalist class. Nothing you can do (well…) can change that fact, and they want you to waste your time on performative protests and attempts at legal reform.
If Luigi had killed his health insurance claim worker instead, you’d never even have known his name. You don’t need to remind me that I’m better than CEOs. I’m completely certain of it. Because I don’t make my daily work harvesting money via the suffering of millions of people.
Look up depraved heart murder.
It’s a real legal tool used by prosecutors all over the country. The idea is that if someone actively chooses to take actions so incredibly dangerous in pursuit of their own interests that it is likely to cause people to die, that indifference to human life can be treated as malice aforethought (intent to kill) and they can be charged with 2nd degree murder for any deaths resulting from thise actions. The classic example would be knowingly selling tainted food or medicine for profit.
And it’s not just a US law. China literally executed executives for signing off on the sale of tainted baby formula.
Brian Thompson intentionally ordered the increased rejection of pre-authorizations for covered procedures and medications in order to drive up profit, resulting in a great deal of injury and death.
Is random people shooting execs in the street my preferred choice for how society handles these issues? No. But when official justice is denied, the inevitable result is people deciding to act on it themselves.
Johnson is dead because he was shot, yes. But more than that, he’s dead because the justice system refuses to hold people like him accountable for their illegal actions.
You really need to know how it works before you argue it. I get that one of you looked this up one day- and the rest of lemmy all piled on thinking that it’s a one-and-done legal defense after only just reading about it, but…
Proof of INTENT TO KILL means he’d have to know without question that they would have died, and that they had NO OTHER MEANS to acquire the procedure. This is nearly impossible to prove and the entire defense could rest on this notion alone.
For the record, I’m not agreeing with this shit-
I’m simply pointing out why it’s not so fucking simple as it seems. Everyone here seems to think the easiest solution is the best solution without ever questioning why the easiest solution seems so easy, yet no one has tried it.
Hope this helps:
https://scholarship.law.duke.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1337&context=dlj
That’s literally not how depraved heart murder works.
The CEO of a Waterpark (schlitterbahn) was arrested for murder after a child died by decapitation on a slide because he’d paid off people who were hurt on it previously to keep quiet so they wouldn’t have to shut down the ride. He didn’t know for sure that particular child would die, or whether anyone would die at all. But he was so indifferent to the known danger that it counted as motive.
Johnson ordered his people to deny millions of medical procedures the patients were entitled to. He absolutely knew people would die, even if he didn’t know any specific person would.
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lol….
Not only did they search the bag without a warrant…
Wasser resumed her search after an 11-minute drive to the police station and almost immediately found the gun and silencer — the latter discovery prompting her to laugh and exclaim “nice,” according to body-worn camera footage. Wasser said the gun was in a side pocket that she hadn’t searched at McDonald’s.
She had the bag in her car for over ten minutes, with not witnesses or video, and then after resuming the incomplete search almost immediately found the gun and silencer. My read is that there is every possibility that the gun and silencer could have been placed in the bag during that transport.
An officer concerned about a bomb accidentally being brought to the police station (again) would hardly forget to look in the bag’s side pockets. Nor is it reasonable to suggest that they could overlook a gun and silencer in the initial search of the bag.
I remember OJ Simpson getting off a double-murder because there was a remote possibility that someone (actually several hundred people) orchestrated a conspiracy to plant evidence.
He stabbed two people to death and there was DNA evidence tying him to the crime scene.
Years later Jurors came out and said they acquitted OJ in response to the Rodney King incident.
You’re thinking of Rodney King. Completely different. Mark Fuhrman committed perjury and tampered with evidence.
You mean hero cop Mark Fuhrman?
Rodney King was the case of a driver who got assaulted by police and brutally beat, it led to rioting across LA because it was captured on video, and King’s iconic “Can’t we all get along” speech on TV. It was the same general time and place, but not directly connected to the OJ case.
Mark Fuhrman may or may not have been some racist tampering with evidence but it still would have taken enormous resources and a risky gamble to frame OJ for… reasons. OJ was not framed, he got off because they turned the trial into a media circus and the jury didn’t understand DNA evidence which was very new and few people had heard of it as an investigation tool. They have tried to leverage Rodney King’s beating but that was only one part of the massive fuck-up by prosecution and the legal system.
My memory of events is still pretty fresh but you’re welcome to look it all up.
Rodney King was connected; Jurors admitted later that they acquitted OJ as “payback” for Rodney King, even though they thought he was guilty
Any movies or other media you’d recommend for getting an accurate and detailed account of the OJ case?
I would have to look it up, I didn’t watch documentaries, I watched it all on live TV at the time. I’m sure there’s boatloads of stories and documentaries on youtube, just beware anything that tries to paint the case as anything other than a massive clusterfuck and failure of the system to safeguard judicial system from money, fame, influence and media hype. What went wrong, was it was the first huge celebrity trial covered on live TV, and all the same nonsense and political bullshit you would expect to happen today, happened then.
The DNA evidence was biggest the key which would have clinched any similar case today, but it was still a very new thing, and people were as dumb about science then as they are now, so that ignorance was leveraged by a rich man’s legal team and whatever political funding they were getting.
Time is a flat circle.
There was more than DNA evidence, there was a fat ton of circumstantial evidence, testimonies from associated people, and of course things like Nicole Brown Simpson having previously called 911 as OJ was beating her up and threatening her life, the whole massive performance piece of the slow-speed bronco chase, it was just a fuckup from the start and everyone involved just wanted to get famous from it.
Not remote, they did. Police corruption let him off. If they let the evidence do its job there was enough to convict.
They went with their instincts and tried to frame a guy who just happened to actually be guilty, and it backfired on them.
LAPD is notoriously corrupt, just like the nypd.
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You seem to be confusing Martin Luther King with Rodney King. No need for you to do legwork.
Martin Luther King Jr doesn’t have any famous trial losses to his name, are you thinking of Rodney King, who was also in LA and whose trial was contemporary?
Rodney King had direct bearing on the OJ trial. Jurors admitted they acquitted OJ as “payback” for King
They’re thinking of Rodney Dangerfield who, quite famously, suffered from a lack of respect.
And he was always suspiciously stepping on ducks whenever he was around…
There are users in here who are utterly confused, look at the other replies. I know the 90’s were now over 3 decades ago but it’s all completely searchable. There are multiple documentaries. I don’t know how people confuse Rodney King, Martin Luther King and the OJ Simpson case all in one thread. Astonishing.
seems only one person got confused, the one that got banned. judging by his username, he was definitely looking for trouble.
it has an uncomfortable “i can’t tell the difference between Black people” vibe. i don’t mind people not remembering the 90s. i do mind people not double checking the broad details real quick
It’s mind blowing particularly to an Oldy McOldface like myself who was there and lived through the events.
Add another one: my brain completely deleted the “King” part and I thought he was talking about the Protestant reformist before reading the replies about OJ and Rodney King.
I should sleep.
OJ got off because the jury wanted retribution for the Martin Luther King trail.
He got off because the jury was subjected to an absolute media circus and was tampered with repeatedly and the lawyers for OJ did everything they could to confuse them about the relatively new technology of DNA analysis, and judge Ito had almost no control over the courtroom, leading to one of the first “memes” of “I’ll allow it.”
You don’t have to do legwork, I remember much of it.
Edit: it took me a moment to realize you said Martin Luther King… I don’t even… man, bruh, just… bruh.
The jurors did actually admit later that they acquitted OJ as “payback” for Rodney King https://www.eviemagazine.com/post/o-j-simpson-juror-admits-believed-simpson-guilty-him-off-payback
This. They’re trying to manufacture probable cause after an illegal search.
“nice” is what you exclaim after discovering what your colleague meant by “I put a little something special in there just for you.” with a wink.
Chain of custody? Evidence bags? Never heard of them.
Yeah, I thought it was known long ago that the chain of possession (or whatever the term is) for the backpack is fucked. Idk why this isn’t being used straight away to throw away all evidence.
Chain of custody is the right term
It is being used. The defense is moving to suppress evidence (his backpack and anything he said before he was locked up), and that’s what these days in court are all about.
The state is trying to tell a complicated story. They claim that he (a) wasn’t detained, (b) voluntarily gave them a fake ID because … nobody knows why, © he didn’t feel like he was being detained, and therefore (d) they arrested him for the fake ID, after which (e) they read him Miranda, and after that (f) they searched his bag as part of arresting him.
That lets them maximize the evidence against him. The problem for the prosecution is that probably the above is actually factually incorrect. It’s the judge’s job to determine exactly where the prosecution and cops are making shit up, which is why the hearings are happening right now. Later the judge will rule on what actually happened, and therefore what evidence can be admitted against him.
The proceedings right now are before the trial. No jury is watching this.
Christy Wasser
That names going on the list.
I find it hard to believe he was just casually carrying around bullets days after allegedly shooting someone…
I would assume they have other evidence as well.
Most of their evidence was grabbed from his backpack while their cameras were off.
It might all get thrown out of court, which would be the most hilarious thing ever.
I know I don’t have a gun, but I have a hard time that you’d bring more than the single magazine you’d have loaded in the gun if your intention is to kill someone then disappear.
Wait, doesn’t everyone bring a loaded ghost gun to McDonald’s?
Bullets in a magazine is NOT a loaded gun. The magazine must be in the gun for it to be considered loaded.
Yup! Pretty much everywhere it’s common knowledge and many times a fact in court cases that if the loaded magazine is not in the firearm then the firearm is not loaded.
Just goes to show how many of these news outlets are bending the facts to make him look guilty. Something I’m sure his legal team will point out and already have a few times.
Those were my bullets. They were on loan before we went to the range together.
Also - these were my underwear. Also on loan.
That photo is epic
In the part of rural Pennsylvania where people have guns. Yeah, Ok.
Nah I don’t believe it. Look at that face. He should be pat on the head and sent home with well-wishes.
With his money, if his victim had been any regular person, he’d already be home, and the victim’s family would be living in a new home with a new car in the garage.
