Pennsylvania police officers who arrested Luigi Mangione last year and searched his possessions based on the possibility that his backpack contained a bomb – and allegedly found a gun and ammunition inside, according to court testimony on Monday.
On the fourth day of an evidentiary hearing for the case against Mangione, charged with gunning down UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson on a Manhattan street, Altoona, Pennsylvania police officer Christy Wasser testified that she was one of the cops who searched Mangione’s backpack on Dec. 9, 2024 after officers responded to a 911 call to a McDonald’s.
In bodycam footage shown to a Manhattan courtroom, Wasser is seen donning rubber gloves before removing the contents of Mangione’s backpack, which also included a silencer and a notebook that prosecutors have described as a “manifesto.”
One of Wasser’s colleagues is heard instructing her to take the backpack to the police station to check it for bombs, but she insists that she search it then and there in the restaurant because to avoid repeating the mistake of another Altoona officer who “brought a bomb back to our police station and placed it inside a cell.”
“I’m just making sure there’s not a bomb in here,” Wasser can be heard saying.
Wasser testified that while searching it at McDonald’s she found an ammunition magazine inside the bag, wrapped in a pair of wet and gray underwear.
“It’s fucking him, 100%,” police officer Stephen Fox can be heard saying in footage.
When Wasser took the backpack and the rest of Mangione’s belongings to the precinct after he was put in custody for having a fake ID and giving police a false name, she almost immediately found a handgun in the side compartment, and later found a silencer.
Mangione — who called in sick on Friday, leading to a postponement of his marathon evidentiary hearing — was in the courtroom on Monday, wearing a charcoal suit with a blue, button-up shirt. He could be seen taking notes, but not watching the bodycam footage played during Wasser’s testimony.
Mangione’s defense team argues that the fruits of Wasser’s and Fox’s search should be excluded because the officer did not have a warrant.
“Patrolwoman Wasser repeated her comment that she was making sure there were no bombs in the backpack, as another officer commented that ‘at this point we probably need a search warrant for it,’” Mangione’s lawyers argue in court papers. “Without calling for the bomb squad, evacuating the McDonald’s or even searching for a bomb, Patrolwoman Wasser placed the backpack in her police car and brought it to the precinct.”
Acting Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Gregory Carro, who presides over the case, has said the suppression hearing is expected to last several days.
Mangione’s counsel, Karen Agnifilo pressed Wasser about whether she and her colleagues were operating solely on the forgery and false identification charges that they were bringing against the defendant or investigating him on behalf of the murder case.
At several points captured on bodycam video, Wasser expressed excitement about the arrest. At one point in McDonald’s Wasser says, “Wow,” to her colleague before stopping herself because she was being recorded, she testified. Back at the station, she laughed as she pulled out a silencer from Mangione’s backpack. At another point she asks her colleague, “Isn’t this all very awesome?” — a comment she said she made because she was “proud of our department” she said. The arrest was big news in a small town like Altoona.
Right after Mangione was shuttled into a squad car at McDonald’s back to the precinct, a group of supervising officers began talking about investigatory steps like going to the Sheetz and the bust stop, where they suspected he had last been. The supervising officers also suggested at this point that they would need a search warrant to continue searching the backpack.
One of Wasser’s supervisors instructed her to “Just leave [the backpack]” when she brings it back to the precinct.
“Isn’t it true that you were actually searching his backpack because you thought that he was the New York City shooter?” Agnifilo asked Wasser. But Wasser responded “No, we search the backpacks of all people placed under arrest.”
Wasser said that the search “was incident to arrest” a Fourth Amendment exception that allows police to search within their immediate reach primarily for their own safety — a fundamental contention between the prosecution and defense.
Though Pennsylvania’s “search to seizure” statute means that officers generally do not need a warrant to search defendants during an arrest, Agnifilo raised a subsection of state law that she said requires officers to get warrants for private property crime scenes.
The hearings continue on Tuesday.
