Trump and Vance to attend Army-Navy game with Daniel Penny
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(WASHINGTON) — President-elect Donald Trump and Vice President-elect JD Vance will make their way to Landover, Maryland, on Saturday to attend the Army-Navy football game and will be joined by Daniel Penny, the Marine veteran recently acquitted in the subway chokehold case in New York City.
Vance posted on X that he invited Penny, who was just acquitted in the death of Jordan Neely, to join him in Trump’s suite.
“Daniel’s a good guy, and New York’s mob district attorney tried to ruin his life for having a backbone,” Vance posted. “I’m grateful he accepted my invitation and hope he’s able to have fun and appreciate how much his fellow citizens admire his courage.”
In the wake of his acquittal, Vance posted that “justice was done in this case. It was a scandal Penny was ever prosecuted in the first place.”
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(NEW YORK) — The ghost gun allegedly in Luigi Mangione’s possession when he was arrested in Pennsylvania has been matched to three shell casings recovered at the scene of Brian Thompson’s murder in New York City, NYPD Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said Wednesday.
Fingerprints recovered from a water bottle and a Kind bar near the crime scene have also been matched to Mangione, she said.
Mangione, a 26-year-old Ivy League graduate, is accused of gunning down Thompson, the UnitedHealthcare CEO, outside a Midtown Manhattan hotel on Dec. 4.
Written on the shell casings were the words “deny,” “defend” and “depose,” according to police sources.
Mangione was apprehended in Altoona, Pennsylvania, on Monday after nearly one week on the run.
Mangione allegedly had a spiral notebook detailing plans about how to eventually kill the CEO, according to law enforcement officials.
One passage allegedly said, “What do you do? You whack the CEO at the annual parasitic bean-counter convention,” the officials said.
The writings said using explosives in the attack could “risk innocents,” according to the officials.
Detectives are still examining Mangione’s writings but are considering the contents of the notebook to represent a confession, sources said.
Investigators have started interviewing members of Mangione’s family, according to sources.
A judge in Pennsylvania ordered Mangione held without bail on Tuesday. In Pennsylvania he faces charges including allegedly possessing an untraceable ghost gun.
Mangione plans to challenge his extradition to New York, where he faces charges including second-degree murder.
“He has constitutional rights and that’s what he’s doing” in challenging the interstate transfer, defense attorney Thomas Dickey told reporters on Tuesday.
Mangione is “taking it as well as he can,” Dickey added.
The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office said it will seek a governor’s warrant to try to force Mangione’s extradition. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said in a statement that she’ll sign a request for the governor’s warrant “to ensure this individual is tried and held accountable.”
Mangione’s attorney told ABC News’ “Good Morning America” on Wednesday that anyone speculating on the case should take the potential evidence “in its entirety,” not taking pieces of writing or other evidence “out of context.”
“People put out certain things, parts of different things,” he said. “I think any lawyer involved in this situation would want to see it all.”
Mangione plans to plead not guilty to the charges in Pennsylvania, Dickey said. Dickey said he anticipates Mangione would also plead not guilty to the second-degree murder charge in New York.
ABC News’ Sasha Pezenik, Mark Crudele, Luke Barr, Peter Charalambous and Josh Margolin contributed to this report.
Luigi Mangione is seen inside the police station in Altoona, Pennsylvania, Dec. 9, 2024/Obtained by ABC News
(NEW YORK) — Luigi Mangione is facing a second-degree murder charge in New York City in connection with the brazen shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in Midtown Manhattan as new details emerge about the suspect and a potential motive, according to police.
“We do have a lot of evidence in this case,” NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch told ABC News’ “Good Morning America” on Tuesday.
“When he was found he was in possession of the same New Jersey fake identification that was used at the hostel” on New York’s Upper West Side before Thompson was gunned down on Dec. 4, she said.
The gun 26-year-old Mangione was allegedly found with on Monday “looks very similar” to the gun used in the murder, “with a similar suppressor,” Tisch said. “So there’s a lot of reasons that we feel very strongly that he is the person of interest.”
Officers allegedly found a black 3D printed pistol and a black silencer, which was also 3D printed, according to the criminal complaint filed in Blair County, Pennsylvania.
“The pistol had one loaded Glock magazine with six nine-millimeter full metal jack rounds. There was also one loose nine-millimeter hollow point round,” according to the complaint.
NYPD Chief of Detective Joe Kenny described the weapon as a “ghost gun,” meaning it had no serial number and was untraceable.
Mangione, who was arrested in Altoona, Pennsylvania, on Monday, remains in the custody of the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections pending his extradition to New York.
The NYPD was “thrilled” to get the call from Altoona police that they had a person of interest in custody, Tisch told “GMA.”
Kenny said “the key to this case” was releasing the photo of the suspect’s face to the media and the public.
“That picture reached Pennsylvania,” where he was recognized at a McDonald’s on Monday morning, he said.
“We are grateful as a city to that person,” Tisch said.
“We had collected early in the investigation some forensic evidence, some DNA evidence, some fingerprints, so we were very confident that we were ultimately going to get to the right person,” Tisch added.
When Mangione was arrested he had several handwritten pages on him that appeared to express a “disdain for corporate America” and indicated “he’s frustrated with the health care system in the United States,” Kenny said.
“Specifically, he states how we are the No. 1 most expensive health care system in the world, yet the life expectancy of an American is ranked 42 in the world,” Kenny said.
Whether Mangione has a personal connection to UnitedHealthcare is unknown, Tisch said, but the writings mention UnitedHealthcare by name, law enforcement sources told ABC News.
The sources described the handwriting as sloppy and included these quotes: “These parasites had it coming” and “I do apologize for any strife and trauma, but it had to be done.”
Police are now looking at Mangione’s travel at various points across the United States and out of the county within the past year, the sources said.
Mangione, a Maryland native and Ivy League graduate, was also charged in New York with possession of a loaded firearm, possession of a forged instrument and criminal possession of a weapon.
He was charged with five crimes in Pennsylvania, including carrying a gun without a license, forgery, falsely identifying himself to authorities and possessing “instruments of crime,” according to the criminal complaint.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(UNITY TOWNSHIP, Pa.) — The body of a missing grandmother who was swallowed by a sinkhole and fell into an abandoned coal mine in Pennsylvania was recovered Friday following a dayslong search, officials said.
Elizabeth Pollard, 64, was found in the mine Friday at approximately 10 a.m., Westmoreland County Coroner Tim Carson confirmed to ABC News. Her body will be transported to their facility for an autopsy to determine the cause and manner of death, he said.
The challenging excavation began Tuesday in Unity Township, about 40 miles southeast of Pittsburgh, after Pollard was reported missing by a family member. She had not been heard from after going out to search for her cat, police said.
The sinkhole is believed to be tied to the mine and formed while Pollard was walking in the area looking for her cat, officials said.
The dangerous search effort shifted to a recovery mission on Wednesday, when authorities surmised it was unlikely Pollard could still be alive based on the conditions underground, including oxygen levels. Search efforts had also not found any sign of life, according to Pennsylvania State Police Trooper Steve Limani, who said at the time it would be a “miracle” to find Pollard alive.
Despite the difficulties posed by the search, including the amount of dirt and unstable conditions of the mine, Limani said they would not stop searching until they found Pollard.
“I know we had a lot of hopes,” Limani said during a press briefing Wednesday evening, calling the development “difficult.”
Authorities said Thursday evening that they believed the excavator had reached the area where Pollard ended up.
Pollard was last seen Monday evening, police said. A couple hours after she was reported missing, her vehicle was located shortly before 3 a.m. Tuesday with her 5-year-old granddaughter safe inside, though Pollard was nowhere to be seen, police said.
While searching for Pollard in the area, troopers found an apparent sinkhole with an opening about the “size of a manhole” 15 to 20 feet away from the vehicle, according to Limani.
Local firefighters, a technical rescue team and the state’s Bureau of Mine Safety worked alongside an excavation team to remove dirt to access the sinkhole.
Search crews were able to make entry into the mine area amid the search, though the integrity of the mine was compromised by the water used to break up the ground, Limani said. Parts of the mine started to buckle and collapse, he said.
Crews stopped accessing the mine on Wednesday due to the danger of collapse, with the search effort shifting to cameras.
Amid the search for Pollard, Limani told reporters Thursday that they have not found her cat, Pepper. Pollard’s family also has not seen the cat, he said.
The area where the sinkhole formed has a “very thin layer of earth” and appears to have been deteriorating “for a long time,” Limani said.
Authorities were mapping other depressions in the area to prevent future accidents.
“People down here should be not afraid to walk around in their yards,” Limani said.
The mine last operated in 1952, according to the state’s Department of Environmental Protection. The depth to the coal seam in this area is approximately 20 feet, a department spokesperson said.
Once the scene is clear, the department will investigate the site “to determine if this issue is the result of historic mine subsidence,” the spokesperson said.
