UnitedHealthcare CEO shooting: Pa. officer testifies how he found accused killer Luigi Mangione in local McDonald's during manhunt

An Altoona, Pennsylvania, police officer testified on Tuesday that he walked into a local McDonald’s last December, skeptical of a tipster’s 911 call that the suspect wanted in the brazen murder of a UnitedHealthcare CEO on a Manhattan street was quietly eating his breakfast inside.

But after asking the man who was about to chow down on a hash brown and a steak and egg McMuffin to lower his mask, Patrolman Joseph Detwiler said all doubt was removed.

"I knew it was him immediately," he told the court during the second day of suppression hearings in the murder case against Ivy League graduate Luigi Mangione.

Prosecutors charge he killed health executive Brian Thompson, 50, to protest the high cost of medical bills.

The deadly Dec. 4 shooting outside the Hilton Hotel on Sixth Avenue dominated the headlines and set off a six-day manhunt by the FBI and the NYPD.

Detwiler said he had seen several photos of the suspect aired on Fox News as well as a video showing a masked man in black approach the health care executive from behind, raise a handgun with a silencer attached and shoot Thompson in the back.

Thompson was hit twice, in the leg and the back, with one bullet piercing his liver and heart, prosecutors said. He died at the scene.

The shooting was so far off the Altoona Police Department’s radar that it was not discussed at roll call or in any other official capacity, Detwiler said. The central Pennsylvania town of 50,000 residents is policed by just 75 officers.

The 911 dispatcher called Detwiler around 9:20 a.m. on Dec. 9, asking him to respond to a call that one of the most wanted suspects in the country was in the local McDonald’s.

"10-4, I’ll be on that," he responded, according an audio recording of the call. "I was being semi-sarcastic when I said that. I did not think it was going to be the person they said it was."

Detwiler’s supervisor, Lt. Thomas Hanley, showed he was equally skeptical in a text message about the call.

"If you get the New York City shooter, I will buy you a hoagie from the local restaurant," Hanley texted Detwiler, he told the court.

"I said, ‘Consider it done,’" he said.

During cross examination, the patrolman said he and his partner didn’t worry about the gun used in the crime or strategize how to approach him.

"I didn’t think it was going to be him," Detwiler said.

Body camera footage from Detwiler and his partner played in the Tuesday hearing shows the officer approaching Mangione and asking him to pull down his mask.

Detwiler asked Mangione to identify himself and patted him down briefly. He also asked him if he had been in New York lately.

Mangione gave the officers what they say was a fake New Jersey driver’s license with the name Mark Rosario.

Momentarily, Detwiler stepped out of the McDonald’s and called his supervisor.

"Tom, it’s him. It’s him," he says on the camera footage. "He’s here. He’s real nervous. I asked if he had been to New York recently and, Tom, I’m 100% sure that it’s him.

Soon, Detwiler was joined by more than half a dozen other police officers, including Hanley. They ran his license to see if it was valid and it came back with no results, the officer testified.

Detwiler said Mangione’s hands were shaking and he seemed evasive, but body camera footage from the officer at the time show him eating his hash brown and then digging into his McMuffin.

Defense lawyers have argued in court papers that the jury should not see evidence collected during the arrest or hear Mangione’s statements because they say their client’s civil rights were violated.

As more officers arrived, the dining area filled up with police officers.

Defense attorney Karen Friedman Agnifilo has argued that her client was surrounded and de facto in police custody, but not properly informed of his right not to self-incriminate.

The officers also searched Mangione’s bag, eventually finding a 3D printed 9 mm ghost gun, a silencer and ammunition. They also found a red notebook with his personal writing, including an apparent reference to the victim being the "perfect target" and appearing to confess to the fatal shooting.

Mangione stands charged with second-degree murder and forgery in Manhattan Supreme Criminal Court, which could carry a life sentence if he’s convicted. He’s also facing federal weapons and murder charges in Manhattan federal court. U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi has promised to seek the death penalty if he’s convicted.

The state court hearings will resume Thursday and are expected to continue into next week.