Deadly Mosque Shooting, Judge Rules on Mangione Notebook, Murdaugh Sues Court Clerk: AM Update 5/19

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0:48Three killed in a shooting at San Diego's largest mosque in an attack authorities are investigating as a hate crime. I find that the search of the backpack at the McDonald's was improper, warrantless search. A big ruling in the Luigi Mangione case as the judge decides on whether prosecutors will be allowed to introduce key evidence in the upcoming trial. The court clerk accused of tainting the jury in the Alec Murdoch murder trial now being sued by Murdoch himself. And the Pacific Ocean may be heating up. A possible Super El Nino now on the radar. All that and more coming up in just a moment on your AM Update.

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2:35Three people, including a security guard, killed yesterday in a shooting at the Islamic Center of San Diego, the city's largest mosque. That's in addition to the two deceased shooters. San Diego Police Chief Scott Wall saying the first active shooter call came in at 11.43 a.m. on Monday, with officers arriving on scene within four minutes. Chief Wall walking reporters through what happened next. Officers arrived on scene and observed immediately three deceased, what appeared to be deceased, victims out in front. They immediately began to deploy with an active shooter response into the mosque and adjacent school.

3:17At about the same time, we began to receive calls from just a couple blocks away that we had more active gunfire. Officers were also responding to that call for service at the same time. There was a landscaper that was doing his work that was shot at and fortunately was not hit. Moments later, officers were called to that location where they found a vehicle in the middle of the street with who we believe to be the shooters in this incident, both deceased. Authorities say the identities of the victims will be released after family members are notified. Chief Wall crediting the deceased security guard with playing, a pivotal role in assisting from this being much worse, calling his actions, heroic.

4:03No children in the adjacent school were harmed. NBC citing two law enforcement officials reporting the names of the suspects as 17-year-old Kane Clark and 18-year-old Caleb Vasquez. Authorities say they died by suicide, self-inflicted gunshot wounds. Police say they were first called two hours before the active shooter notification by the mother of one of the suspects, who, according to NBC, said her son had gone missing along with her firearms and her car, telling police her son was suicidal and probably in the company of a friend, saying both young men were wearing fatigues. As soon as the call came in about the mosque shooting, police immediately dispatching themselves there, according to Chief Wall.

4:49The FBI is assisting in the investigation, Chief Wall saying it's being investigated as a hate crime, quote, until it's not. CNN reporting unspecified hate speech was scrawled on one of the weapons recovered by law enforcement. The suspect who reportedly took the firearm from his mother's home, leaving behind a suicide note containing, quote, writings about racial pride, Asked about what the hate speech included, Chief Wall responding. There was no specific threat, especially no specific threat to the Islamic Center. It was just general hate kind of speech that I think covered a wide gamut. I don't want to go into any of the specifics at this point.

5:29Again, we are still actively investigating this as we speak, but it was more generalized. A split ruling yesterday in the Luigi Mangione murder case with a New York State Supreme Court judge suppressing some of the evidence from the initial police search, but allowing prosecutors to use two key items found in a subsequent search at the station, the alleged murder weapon and Mangione's notebook. 28-year-old Mangione is accused of assassinating United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson outside of a Manhattan hotel on December 4, 2024. The brutal slaying captured on surveillance video showing the suspect approaching Thompson, a husband and father of two, from behind and opening fire at close range before fleeing, igniting a five-day manhunt culminating about 230 miles from Manhattan at a McDonald's in Altoona, Pennsylvania.

6:23Police finding Mangione seated at a table eating breakfast, his laptop on the table in front of him and his backpack at his feet. After asking him to lower his mask, one officer recognizing him as the man wanted in the New York shooting. Mangione handing officers a fake New Jersey driver's license before eventually admitting his real name. As more officers arrived, police moving the backpack and laptop away from Mangione and onto a separate table. Mangione then handcuffed and placed under arrest. Officers searching his pockets and clothing first before turning to the backpack, where they began pulling out items including a red notebook, cell phone, passport, wallet, computer chip, and loaded magazine.

7:07Police then stopping that search before fully going through the bag, taking the backpack back to the station where officers later found the alleged murder weapon, the silencer, and where they actually reviewed the red notebook during an inventory search. Those events setting up the core fight at a nine-day evidence hearing in December 2025. Prosecutors contending all of the items found in the backpack should be allowed at trial, including the gun, silencer, ammunition, notebook, and handwritten notes. The defense arguing police searched the backpack multiple times before getting a warrant, making the evidence illegally obtained.

7:45Mangione's lawyers also asking the court to suppress statements he made to police, maintaining that officers questioned him before reading him his Miranda rights, then kept questioning him after he indicated he wanted to remain silent. Judge Gregory Caro ultimately suppressing most items pulled from the backpack during the warrantless search inside the McDonald's, including the cell phone, passport, wallet, computer chip, and loaded magazine. But the judge allowing prosecutors to use the evidence found later at the station during the inventory search, including the gun, silencer, and USB drive, along with Mangione's red notebook, because officers, the court found, did not open or search the notebook during the McDonald's search, but only reviewed it later during the station inventory.

8:34Judge Carroll yesterday explaining why the first search did not pass muster, but the second one did. I find that the search of the backpack at the McDonald's was improper, warrantless search, that the backpack was not within the immediate control or grabable area of the defendant, and further the people failed to demonstrate exigent circumstances. Therefore, those items found in the backpack during the search at the McDonald's will be suppressed. However, the people have established that the subsequent search of the backpack at the station was a valid inventory search and therefore the items recovered at the station will not be suppressed.

9:18The surviving evidence leaves prosecutors their two most important pieces to proving their case. A gun they say is connected with shell casings recovered from the murder scene, and a notebook they describe as a manifesto. In one entry dated August 15, 2024, Mangione allegedly writing, quote, I finally feel confident about what I will do. The details are coming together, and I don't feel any doubt about whether it's right slash justified. The entry continuing, quote, I'm glad in a way that I've procrastinated because it allowed me to learn more about United Healthcare. Judge Carroll also suppressing some of Mangione's statements to police, including answers he gave while officers were pressing him about the fake ID before Miranda warnings were properly given and after he indicated he wanted to remain silent.

10:07But the judge allowing basic identifying statements to be used, including Mangione's name, date of birth, and middle initial. ABC News legal analyst Brian Buckmeyer on how yesterday's ruling could impact the jury selection process. People are clearly watching ABC and other networks and watching this. When jury selection happens and they ask the question of, well, did you hear about the magazine or the passport or other things that might have been evidence of flight or criminality? And they see, I heard about that. Well, did that impact your way you're going to decide this case? Yeah, it kind of does.

10:37Those people are off the case now. There won't be in the jury. We're going to find a much more narrow jury who hasn't heard a lot of the evidence so far. And it's going to come down to people who can either push all of that aside or have heard very little or nothing about this case. Mangione is facing nine state felony charges in Manhattan, including second degree murder and multiple weapons related counts. If convicted on the top state murder charge, he faces 25 years to life in prison. Jury selection is set to begin September 8th in Manhattan Supreme Court, with the trial expected to last roughly six weeks.

11:09Manjoni is also facing a separate slate of federal charges, but that case is expected to move forward only after the state trial wraps up. Coming up, Alec Murdaugh now suing the former clerk accused of tainting the jury that convicted him of murdering his wife and son, and a possible Super El Nino brewing in the Pacific, what that could mean for worldwide weather trends.

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13:172023 of murdering his wife, Maggie, and their son, Paul, sentenced to life in prison in a case that captivated the nation and shattered one of South Carolina's most prominent legal families. Just months after the convictions, Murdoch's attorneys moving for a new trial, claiming they had uncovered evidence of jury tampering. A judge denying that request in January of 2024, but Murdoch's attorneys immediately vowing to appeal. And last week, the South Carolina Supreme Court unanimously overturning the murder convictions, finding Murdaugh was denied his right to a fair trial because of Hill's improper influence on the jury, ordering the entire murder case to be tried again.

13:57The justices acknowledging the enormous time, money, and effort spent on the original trial, but writing it had, quote, no choice but to send the case back for a new one. The court writing that Hill, quote, placed her fingers on the scales of justice. After finding she suggested to jurors that they should not trust Murdoch's testimony, telling the jurors not to be, quote, fooled or confused by the defense and pressuring the jury to, among other things, reach a quick verdict. Now Murdoch's attorneys using that ruling as the foundation for a new civil lawsuit against Hill. Attorney Jim Griffin announcing the lawsuit yesterday.

14:35Today, in the United States District Court, federal court, the Charleston Division, we filed the lawsuit on behalf of Richard Alexander Murdoch Sr. v. Rebecca Hill. In this lawsuit, we filed it under the Federal Civil Rights Statute, 42 United States Code, 1983, to redress constitutional deprivation of rights. Those rights were Alex's right to a fair trial, a right that him be tried before an untampered, untainted jury. With the South Carolina Supreme Court's ruling, it has been adjudged as a matter of state law that she deprived Alec of his constitutional rights, deprived him of a right to a fair trial, and as a result, we've got to do it all over again, which nobody wants to do.

15:31Murdoch's attorneys pointing to what they say was Hill's motive, alleging she used her access to the trial and the jurors as an opportunity for personal financial gain. The judge, who initially heard evidence of alleged jury tampering, found that Hill was, quote, attracted by the siren call of celebrity. After the verdict, Hill co-authoring a book about the case titled, quote, Behind the Doors of Justice, The Murdaugh Murders. Her co-author later telling NBC the book generated about$100 ,000 in profits, 65 % of which went to Hill and her husband. The lawsuit claiming Hill pushed jurors into a guilty verdict in an effort to juice book sales.

16:09Quote, she wanted to write a book about the most high-profile trial in South Carolina history so she could buy a lake house. More here from Murdoch's attorney, Jim Griffin. The damages that we've alleged include the over$600 ,000 that was spent to try the first case and other compensatory damages. Now, let me be clear. Alec Murdoch owes a lot of people a lot of money. None of this money that is recovered will go to him personally. And the purpose of this lawsuit is to hold Becky Hill accountable for what she did. She has not been held account at all for her conduct. And two, is to investigate exactly what she did, which we'll be able to do through the course of civil litigation.

17:00We have subpoena power. We can take depositions. And so we're going to be able to understand the entire scope of her conduct. She's yet to be thoroughly investigated by the state, and she's not been held accountable by the state. Hild denies improperly influencing the jury, though she resigned from her position in 2024 and in 2025 pleaded guilty in a separate criminal case tied to the Murdoch trial, admitting she showed sealed court exhibits to a photographer and lied about it in court. The judge sentenced her to one year of probation. As for Murdaugh, the 57-year-old remains in prison on separate financial crimes convictions, serving a 40-year federal sentence after pleading guilty to stealing millions from clients, along with a concurrent 27-year state sentence for similar financial crimes.

17:55Forecasters now increasingly confident El Nino is on the way. For those who don't remember middle school earth science, here's the BBC with the basic idea. El Nino is a natural climate pattern where the tropical Pacific Ocean warms up well above normal levels. Think of the Pacific like a radiator. When it's turned on, the heat transfers into the atmosphere, boosting the global average temperature. You might have also heard of La Nina, and that's the cooler than average phase. We were just in that phase last winter, but now the tropical Pacific is warming up very quickly. And the latest data suggests we're already close to or even past the threshold for El Nina to begin.

18:35It can bring chaos to weather patterns all over the world, and it's expected to keep building, peaking in strength later this year. The Pacific warming fast enough that forecasters say it could develop into what some call a super El Nino. Though not an official term, super El Nino generally refers to conditions where key parts of the equatorial Pacific run at least two degrees Celsius above average. The last El Nino beginning in 2023, lasting until 2024, and the last super El Nino occurring in 2015 extending through 2016. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, releasing a report late last week estimating an 82 % chance El Nino develops between now and July and a 96 % chance of sticking around through the winter.

19:24Raleigh, North Carolina-based outlet WRAL reporting this El Nino could be one of the strongest events observed in more than 140 years. And while that sounds dramatic, the effects are not as simple as bigger El Nino, bigger disaster, as every El Nino behaves differently. So what does this mean for the world? More here from the BBC. We do know it's likely to have more of an impact to those regions around the Pacific. So flooding in northern Peru and southern Ecuador is common, but also potentially in East Africa, Central Asia, and southern portions of North America. At the same time, other regions get the opposite effects.

20:03But here in the U.S., El Nino could lead to at least one upside, a less intense hurricane season. WRAL reporting that during El Nino years, winds high above the Atlantic get stronger, making it harder, though not impossible, for hurricanes to form. As for American skiers, Powder.com predicts the southwest, southern Rockies, Gulf Coast, and Southeast have better odds for cooler, wetter weather, while the Pacific Northwest and parts of the Northern Tier, including the Northern Rockies, look drier and warmer, which means skiing in California looks pretty good. In Montana, not so much. That'll do it for your AM Update.

20:49I'm Megan Kelly. Join me back here for the MK Show, live on SiriusXM's The Megan Kelly Channel, 111 at noon east, on youtube.com slash megankelly, and on all podcast platforms.

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