Posing as an FBI agent, man tried to free Luigi Mangione from jail, officials say

A Minnesota man with a history of mental illness, armed with a pizza cutter and a barbecue fork, posed as an FBI agent on Wednesday and claimed to have a judge's order to free Luigi Mangione from the Brooklyn federal lockup, according to prosecutors and court records.

Mark Anderson, 36, of Mankato, did not convince officials with the Federal Bureau of Prisons, who detained him until he could be charged with impersonating an FBI agent.

Anderson did not enter a plea at his arraignment and his lawyer, Michael Weil of the Federal Defenders of New York, asked Magistrate Judge Taryn Merkl to release him into his agency's custody so that he could be taken to a hospital for evaluation and treatment.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Jack Dennehy requested the Midwesterner be remanded into federal custody, arguing that he is a flight risk and a danger to the community.

He said that Anderson has a lengthy criminal history in his native Minnesota and more recently, he has three open cases in the Bronx for weapons possession and menacing his former employer.

"He went to a federal jail. He claimed he was an FBI agent. Said he had a judge's order to release an inmate. Said he had a bag of weapons, which he did," Dennehy said.

Merkl asked if he tried to release an inmate, without naming Mangione.

"He's an actual inmate and he's very well known," the prosecutor said.

His attorney said that Anderson had been "in the system from the age of 14 years old."

"He's very alone in this world," Weil said.

Anderson asked the judge to seal the body-worn camera footage from the incident, though it had not been introduced during the hearing.

Anderson could be heard complaining to his attorney about the "Wall Street cartel."

Merkl ordered him detained in the Metropolitan Detention Center, the same facility that he had visited on Wednesday to try and spring Mangione.

"I agree that he could benefit from evaluation and treatment," the judge said. "We need a concrete plan."

Anderson, who moved from the Midwest to New York City recently, had been working in Louie & Ernie's Pizza in the Bronx until he lost his job in an apparent dispute with the owners, according to federal prosecutors. Owner Cosimo Tiso confirmed in an interview Anderson worked there.

Criminal court records show that Anderson had been charged with pulling a fake gun on Tiso on Oct. 4.

The pizzeria owner told Newsday that Anderson had worked there for about a year and a half or so, ending in April, as "a prep guy" who was "kind of hidden" in the back, doing sink work, cleaning, grating cheese and more.

At some point, according to Tiso, Anderson seemed like he changed.

"Till the very end he seemed like he wasn’t the person I hired," Tiso said. "He was a solid employee for some time and then something happened. I don’t know what happened," Tiso said.

As for the instrument Anderson allegedly carried to do the breakout — which resembles a pizza slicer — Tiso said it did not belong to that pizzeria.

"That’s not mine. That doesn’t belong to me. I’d seen what they had there in the picture. That does not belong to me," he said. "We don’t use that pizza cutter."

On Wednesday, shortly before 7 p.m. Anderson approached the intake area inside the MDC and told Federal Bureau of Prisons employees that he was an FBI agent in possession of paperwork "signed by a judge" authorizing the release of an inmate who was in custody at the jail, according to the complaint filed Thursday.

That inmate was Mangione, the law enforcement official said. Mangione is charged with second-degree murder for the fatal shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson on Dec. 4, 2024. His federal trial is scheduled for opening arguments on Oct. 14.

When Bureau of Prisons officials asked to see Anderson's credentials, he showed them a Minnesota driver’s license and then "threw at the BOP officers" numerous other documents related to filing claims against the Department of Justice, according to the complaint.

Federal court records show that Anderson filed a suit against the FBI, claiming "mental and internal unlawful inducement by Iran and the Satanic Church."

Thompson, 50, was killed as he walked to a midtown Manhattan hotel for UnitedHealth Group’s annual investor conference.

Surveillance video showed a masked gunman shooting him from behind. Police say "delay," "deny" and "depose" were written on the ammunition, mimicking a phrase used to describe how insurers avoid paying claims.

Mangione, a 27-year-old Ivy League graduate from a wealthy Maryland family, was arrested five days later at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania, about 230 miles west of Manhattan.

Mangione has pleaded not guilty to federal and state murder charges. The state charges carry the possibility of life in prison while the Justice Department officials have said they plan to seek the death penalty.

Correction: The first name of Cosimo Tiso was incorrect in a prior version of this story.