A Killing in Midtown

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0:45Visit progressive.com to find a car insurance rate that works for you. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. Tonight on Dateline. He stepped out from behind the SUV. He knew exactly what he was doing. There was no hesitation. Inside the case of Luigi Mangione, accused in the brazen murder of healthcare CEO Brian Thompson. Brian was a lifelong friend. He was a wonderful person, a great father. A close friend of the victim, and two detectives involved in the manhunt speaking out for the first time. There's a lot of urgency. This guy took somebody's life.

1:25He's dangerous. When he lowered the mask, that's when we were like, oh, we got something here. The eyebrows were quite distinguishing. He looked like the CEO's here. People were trying to learn who this person was. This was like an all-American boy. They walked in the door and all the girls turned their head. The Luigi I met that night wouldn't be capable of what he's accused of. This was targeted. He allegedly had writings about health care. I cannot understand how this person is seen as a hero. What does this say if violence is being celebrated? What does that say about our country? A notorious murder here on the streets of New York, sparking both fury and fascination.

2:05New details and where the case might go from here. I'm Lester Holt, and this is Dateline.

2:20Here is A Killing in Midtown.

2:29In the pre-dawn darkness of December 4th, 2024, on the mostly empty Manhattan streets, one man was up and ready for what was sure to be a busy day. No shock to me that Brian was up and the first one arriving at that hotel. Brian Thompson, the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, was walking into this Hilton hotel for the company's annual investors conference. Jeff Alter is his friend and former colleague. In your industry, this is a big game. It's really our one opportunity to show who we are and what we're planning on doing in the upcoming year. Jeff says the all-day conference required months of preparation, and Brian likely would have been working late the night before.

3:17I knew how tough those days were, and I had texted Brian from the train, you know, good luck today. So you texted him a note of encouragement? Yep. Did he respond? He didn't. What his friend didn't know was that someone else had also been preparing for this day. Brian was walking into a trap. Did he sense the man approaching? In a flash of violence, the paths of these two strangers intersected. The masked man fired three shots before fleeing, leaving Brian to die on the sidewalk. Breaking news, a shooting in Midtown. 50-year-old Brian Thompson was shot multiple times. Detectives still on the scene.

3:58The response was immediate and intense. Police searching for that brazen gunman. A shooting in Midtown Manhattan. The victim, a prominent businessman, and a gunman on the loose. I was still on the train, and I was getting texts from former colleagues at first just saying, I can't believe what happened to Brian. My first inclination was, did he get sick? Did he get fired? Then he read the headlines. Just devastated. You know, I thought he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, maybe got mugged or something like that. But police quickly had a different take. Was your initial hunch targeted? Yeah, 100%.

4:45Detective Sergeant John Griffin, now retired, was the senior sergeant of the NYPD's Major K-Squad at the time. This is his first interview about the investigation. He says the NYPD accessed that security video of the murder almost immediately, and it told a story. We stepped out from behind the SUV, knew exactly what he was doing. There was no hesitation. It looked like he was waiting for the victim. This wasn't a mugging that led to the shooting? No. But it is very similar to a lot of narcotics-related homicides that we've dealt with. Which can be targeted? Absolutely. This is in the NYPD's wheelhouse.

5:27this is what we do. You have a crime scene unit that comes out. They have to take photos of everything. They have to block things off. Retired NYPD detective Joe Mitsopoulos was on the team that worked the case, trying to figure out who would target the 50-year-old father of two from Minnesota. You start widening your canvas, and a canvas is basically checking the area for evidence. Now, evidence would be shell casings, they would be cameras, they'd be witnesses, that kind of stuff. That initial canvas made clear that the murderer Brian Thompson had nothing to do with his personal life. The motive was right here on the sidewalk.

6:05Two spent bullet shells, a third unfired round, each inscribed with a different word, delay, depose, deny. I was like, whoa, okay, it's not just a shooting on the street. Lorena O 'Neill is a contributing writer at Rolling Stone. She has been reporting on the case from the beginning, starting with the story told by those three words. Which are words that are commonly used to criticize how the health insurance industry handles claims. It's suggesting the pattern that they typically change. Right. It was the first important clue for investigators. It definitely meant it was targeted. It definitely meant that it probably had some sort of a relation to the health care system.

6:53The murder instantly transformed into something much bigger. A national venting of anger and frustration over the health care system. This was a man. This was a father of two. But in the discourse, he's being dehumanized. I think what ended up happening is the victim became the villain. He has become a symbol. as did Luigi Mangione. Tonight, we have new insights into the two men at the center of it all. He was very proud of where he came from, very humble. I really think that the Luigi I met that night was still a normal person that wouldn't be capable of what he's accused of. I think millions of people see some of themselves in Mangione and that's why they love him so much.

7:41We'll take an exclusive look inside the manhunt. Sometimes the best thing to do is go backwards. You were following a trail of the opposite direction. Right. And try to answer the central question. What might have set the collision course of these two men in motion? That's the million dollar question, right?

8:12UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson had been gunned down on the street in Manhattan. And now the NYPD was hunting for a killer. What did you fear might happen if you didn't get the shooter in custody quickly? A lot of people thought that there might be more to come. And almost immediately, it was clear this was no normal murder case. Online sympathy was not with the victim. Of course people have no sympathy for the CEO of UnitedHealthcare. They're tired of CEOs making millions of dollars while their family members are not being taken care of properly. I don't think anyone should feel bad about this.

8:49Social media is fast and cruel. People posting smiley faces that somebody was murdered. Just, it's just beyond me. Cruel is the word he used. Really cruel. Yeah. Particularly for people who knew Brian. Jeff Alter is the first person in Brian Thompson's inner circle to speak publicly about the case. He wants people to know more about the man he got to know over some 20 years. A man who rose to corporate CEO from small town kid. Iowa farm boy, was that something he wore as a badge of honor? Yes. He was very proud of where he came from, very humble, particularly proud of his father, a hardworking farmer who, even at the end of a long, tough day, gave back to his town.

9:36Brian was valedictorian in high school and at the University of Iowa, where he studied business administration and accounting on a full scholarship. He married his high school sweetheart, joined a prestigious corporate accounting firm in Minneapolis, and the couple had two boys. In 2004, he moved over to UnitedHealthcare, also in Minnesota, Iowa still tugging at his sleeve. He wanted to be all things for all people? I think he thought that this was a wonderful opportunity for him to better the life of his children. And he'd ask me, is he doing the right thing for his children? Should they move back?

10:15But Brian was on a fast track to the top. Was he the kind of guy that people looked at and said he's going to be CEO someday? We'd all say, yeah, he could be. Brian did become CEO of UnitedHealthcare in 2021. Hi, I'm Brian Thompson. Here he is making a presentation at a healthcare leadership forum. Our mission and values are focused on helping people live healthier lives and making the health system work better for everyone. In just two years as CEO, he aggressively expanded the company, the biggest health insurer in the country, covering nearly 50 million people. Even as the company faced criticism for patient coverage, profits rose more than 30 percent to over$16 billion.

11:02We're thrilled to be the presenting sponsors. Brian also engaged in philanthropy and was named an honorary co-chair of the Special Olympics. He was beyond just being a super smart, driven person. He was a great person to be around. The investors' conference was another chance to boost the company. But Brian didn't make it there. And now, his killer was on the run. Were you afraid you had lost him at that point? No, we just hadn't found him. He's there. We're going to find something. Investigators studied clues from the scene, those inscribed cartridges, and that CCTV video of the murder. What do you know about the weapon that he used?

11:48We could tell right away that it was some sort of a semi-automatic. It had something on the front, either like a homemade suppressor or silencer type of thing. Is that a common thing, that you uncover people with silencers? No. 25 years, I don't think I've ever actually encountered a silencer before that. From the get-go, tips flooded in. Major K-Squad Detective Joe Metzopoulos ran down some of the 300-plus leads. They varied in, hey, that's my next door neighbor, or this person has a vendetta against the health care system. We had tons of those. The FBI helped out with a lot of the out-of-state tips because we were getting tips from all over the country.

12:26Do you remember any in particular that stood out to you? There's one that I remember where it was a family's young child had died waiting for authorization for some sort of treatment. others where a spouse had passed away and treatment was either denied or deemed not necessary they were horrible to read these people were fingering someone who they thought had a big enough of a grudge usually yes to commit violence yeah when they were legitimate tips you had to make sure that that person wasn't here in new york when this happened those tips didn't lead anywhere but something else did you can't be on guard 24 7 there's gonna be little slip-ups But that's what you count on is the slip up.

13:10Exactly.

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14:49For detectives trying to track down Brian Thompson's killer, their most powerful investigative tool was practically staring them in the face. Inside, taxi cabs, trains, buses, and on the streets. So we're actually not far from the shooting, but we're at a different intersection in Manhattan right now, and we're being observed. All over us, everywhere. Cameras. Yep. John Griffin took us onto Manhattan streets and showed us how the NYPD built a video timeline of the manhunt. So that's controlled by the New York City police? Correct. And any detective can get that from their desk. So if something happens here, the case detective is going to look at that camera from his desk and figure out where you went.

15:33And then they're going to go back and they're going to find all these buildings down here, down here, that have video. And where they lose you, they're going to go to those videos and try to pick you up and they're just going to keep going. So keep laying in the pieces. They're just going to keep going forward, forward, forward. And there's almost nowhere to hide in the city, Lester. I remember us reviewing tons of the cameras that are always on the corners like that, just following. You know, for a little bit of a second of all it captured, and then it led to another block, and then to another block.

16:03As investigators search for the shooter, they did something that sounds counterintuitive. Most people want to look forward. Where did the guy go? How did he get away? Let's find him. For an investigation, sometimes the best thing to do is go backwards. So you were following a trail of the opposite direction. Right, for the days before the murder. Somebody commits a crime and they just want to get out of there. And they'll do whatever they can not to be tracked. Sometimes the 12 hours before that, they may not be thinking about the crime. And you can't be on guard 24-7. There's going to be little slip-ups.

16:36But that's what you count on is the slip-up. Exactly. Here is the shooter before the murder, emerging from a subway station and pacing what would become the crime scene. Investigators tracked him backwards, camera by camera, to a Starbucks and to a hostel on Manhattan's Upper West Side. And that's where the slip-up happened. A camera captured an image of the suspect with his mask lowered, exposing his face. That was the one where he was smiling. That's when we were like, we got something here to run with. Authorities say these clear photos are of a person of interest taken at the hostel. They also got a name.

17:15The suspect had checked into the hostel as Mark Rosario. To find this Mark Rosario now, they went back to a daisy chain of video clips taken after the murder, tracking his escape. There was some really good, interesting video of him as he left the scene. And then the bike up north into Central Park. Cameras don't capture the whole of Central Park, about two and a half miles long. But experienced investigators soon picked up the trail. They eventually tracked him up into northern Manhattan. So he abandons the bike at some point. Yeah, the last place that we had video of him was up near the Port Authority bus terminal by the GW Bridge.

18:00Then it was like, all right, well, what are we going to do now? Where do we get to the end bin? That's where we wanted. But his trail went cold. Days ticked by, and online, his support was growing. Activists set up a legal defense fund for the unnamed suspect. When did you first become aware that this figure was becoming something of a folk hero? There was some talk of that from right in the beginning. How did you react to it, though, that people would think of him as a do-gooder as opposed to a murder suspect? It didn't sit well. NYPD detectives routinely look at people that die either from homicides or accidents on the street.

18:43And you see the fragility of life. You cannot sanctify somebody who does this and make them a hero.

18:53Five days after the murder, Brian Thompson's family and friends gathered under heavy guard at a church in Minnesota. It was a private invitation-only funeral. Jeff Alter couldn't be there, but says his heart broke for Brian's family. His wife, his children, his mother, who had just lost her husband not too long before that, and now she's losing one of her sons. The law enforcement presence included a sniper on the roof, a recognition of the public sentiment surrounding Brian's murder. It was also a reminder that the suspect was still out there, but not for long. He looked like the CEO shooter from New York.

19:38An arrest was coming, along with a fascination about how this young man ended up accused of murder. So he walked in the door and all of a sudden all the girls like, you know, turned their head, looked at him. Like, who's this new guy?

20:03While Brian Thompson's family was laying him to rest, on that same day, a thousand miles away... 911, what is the address of your emergency? The manager of a McDonald's in Altoona, Pennsylvania called 911. It's not really an emergency. I have a customer here that some other customers were suspicious of. A young man was eating breakfast alone. He looked like the CEO shooter from New York. A patrol unit arrived. Two officers approached with body cams rolling. Can I sound like that? Yes, sir. You should. Someone called. They thought you were suspicious. Oh, I'm sorry. Is your ID on you? Yes, sir.

20:48One officer took the ID and stepped away to call it in. He's got a driver's license that says Rosario. And I'm like, New Jersey driver's license? The name on the ID matched the name of the man who dropped his mask at that Manhattan hostel. But officers on the scene suspected it was a fake ID and pressed him for his real name, which he told them, Luigi Mangione. He was arrested and extradited to New York. The spectacle of his arrival by helicopter, escorted by the mayor and a phalanx of law enforcement, only intensifying the public's infatuation. Free Luigi and his beautiful eyebrows. They didn't know that America was going to be rooting for the assassin, right?

21:39They're going to give the people what they want, right? I try, but I cannot understand how this person is seen as a hero. I try not to, but I lose some faith in humanity. We've all been trying to figure out who Luigi Mangione really is. Are you getting any closer? I've been working on it for about a year, and I still don't know that I have everything. Lorena O 'Neal has interviewed more than 30 sources, family members, friends, and law enforcement, trying to untangle Mangione's life, and she shared her reporting with us. From everything that I've heard about him, from his friends and family, he was just a friendly guy who didn't stand out as controversial or troubled or anything like that.

22:25He wasn't the stereotypical, oh, he was quiet and kept to himself. He engaged people. No, he wasn't an outsider. He was social. He had friends. She learned that unlike Brian Thompson, Mangione was born into a life of wealth and privilege. His family owned businesses, including a country club, assisted living facilities, and a radio station. Mangione was raised in suburban Baltimore, the youngest of three. The teachers I spoke with at Gilman were saying, we always thought he'd end up making some scientific discovery or some technological advance for society. You mentioned Gilman. This is an elite high school.

23:07Very elite high school. Within the people that went to Gilman, he was known to be amongst the smartest. And Mangione had something in common with Brian Thompson. He was valedictorian of his class. It's been an incredible journey, and I simply can't imagine the last few years with any other group of guys. Thank you. Meggioni got an Ivy League education in computer science and engineering. In 2022, he relocated to Hawaii, moving in with a techie co-living community called Surf Break and worked as a data engineer for an online car marketplace. He was working remotely. By all accounts, he was a very outdoorsy person, And he enjoyed the lifestyle in Hawaii that he could have as a community of digital nomads.

23:58He spilled his life out online. Under the Mr. Cactus Reddit handle, widely believed to be his, there were posts about gaming and travel and about his health. He was also at the time suffering with some kind of back ailment. Yes, he had been complaining of back problems ever since he was in middle school, and it seemed to get worse when he was in Hawaii. This post said, it went bad to the point where I felt it every day. I trained in India. I trained in a little yoga therapy. I'm good at dealing with people with injuries. Dorian Wright teaches yoga in Honolulu. I remember when Luigi came in because he's a good-looking guy.

24:40So he walked in the door, and all of a sudden all the girls turned their head, looked at him, Like, who's this new guy? He said, hey, my name's Luigi. I said, oh, nice to meet you. I'll take care of you. You know, he's such a mystery to so many people. What was your impression? Just a normal guy, like a normal, young, happy, you know, and a great smile. Nothing out of the ordinary. Was he making friends? Yeah, I heard he made a lot of friends. I know he was on Tinder because he matched up with one of our yoga teachers. Dorian says he worked with Mangione off and on for about a year. How was his back?

25:13Was he improving? Definitely, yeah. He felt great. He said he felt way better after he did a class with me. But as helpful as the yoga was, Mangione's back problems didn't go away. In the summer of 2023, he quit his job and traveled home for surgery to fuse two vertebrae, posting x-ray images of spinal scaffolding. The surgery seemed to be a success. A post said a week later he was on literally zero pain meds and was able to sit, walk, and stand for as long as he wanted. Did he ever in your presence mention health care? No, he never mentioned health care. The topic of health care doesn't seem to add up.