← Drop Dead Serious With Ashleigh Banfield
Drop Dead Serious With Ashleigh Banfield
Luigi Mangione: Crucial Evidence TOSSED? New Details & Body Cam Released In Court
00:45:46
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- [00:00]
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- [00:59]
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- [01:35]
Ashley Banfield
Hi everyone, I'm Ashley Banfield and this is drop dead serious. What do you suppose Luigi Mangione is pondering in his jail cell right about now? We're two days into a hearing that could be the difference between life and death. His life and death because he's set to stand trial for that execution styled murder of Brian Thompson, you know, the CEO of UnitedHealthc. And arguably his case hinges on two extraordinary important pieces of evidence. A gun that traced back to the murder and a manifesto that he allegedly wrote about his plans. Both of those things were found in his backpack right when the police searched his backpack immediately upon arresting him at the McDonald's in Pennsylvania.
- [02:31]
But his lawyers are trying to get that search thrown out and if they can do it, if they are successful, it could mean, like, the whole ball of wax. It could mean a not guilty verdict in Luigi's case. And remember, the feds are going for the death penalty, right? The state isn't, but the feds are. So after two days of fighting that search in court and the contents that the cops found, what do you think Luigi's thinking in his cell at night? I have an idea.
- [03:07]
That it is a hell of an uphill climb. Like a total Hail Mary pass. A long shot that is longer than the island of Manhattan. Luigi Mangione is spending much of this week in a New York City courtroom, almost exactly one year to the day after allegedly gunning down that insurance exec in Manhattan. The actual anniversary is this Thursday, December 4th. I'm recording this on December 2nd. But just this past Monday, December 1st, Luigi walked into the courtroom in shackles, but the judge let him swap out his jailhouse jumpsuit for some pretty nice threads, right? I have day one and day two all wrapped up for you in this episode. And let me tell you, day one was nothing like day two. In fact, I felt entirely different about his chances after day two. And that's saying a lot, because I was, like, locked in on day one. It's over. This is stupid. This is just, you know, an effort in preserving his rights, giving him the most robust events, making sure the appellate issues aren't, you know, really strong. That's what I thought about day one. Let's just get through the motions. They are not getting rid of the backpack. And then came day two. So let me start here. Let me start with something that a lot of his fan club notices immediately. His wardrobe in court. And we have the actual wardrobe note that officially spells out what he is allowed to wear all week long during his case. A case to get rid of life and death evidence. Right. But the fashion apparently matters. The allowance for civilian clothing for this week includes two suits, three shirts, three sweaters, three pairs of pants, five pairs of socks, and a one pair of shoes. And here's the caveat with those. No laces allowed. Still an inmate. As for the hearing itself, he is allowed to lose the hardware, meaning he can sit in court unshackled. I mean, honestly, if he were to do one of those things that you see in the shows where the inmate, like, gets up and bolts for the door, you know, the court staff run after them. Sometimes they leap over the railing. I don't think he'd get too far. He's Luigi Mancione, right? One of the most recognizable defendants, arguably in the news. These Days. But I should also note, this is state court, right? And in state court, Luigi is facing nine charges, the most serious of which is murder. Right? But he's also facing a federal charge. Murder. Federal murder for the very same crime. And the feds in that case are seeking the death penalty. So, yeah, serious stuff. The state trial is likely going to happen first. And Luigi's backpack, which was brimming with smoking guns when they caught him, almost literally brimming with smoking guns. That backpack is either going to have a starring role in his case or it is not going to come up at all. And that is what Luigi really hopes, that no one ever mentions the backpack in front of a jury because he had that backpack with him at the McDonald's restaurant. When he was spotted and arrested in Altoona, Pennsylvania, five days after the shooting, the local cops who arrested him searched the backpack right then and there at the McDonald's. And when they saw what was inside, they must have thought that was a jackpot because they found, among other things, a 3D printed handgun that the prosecutors say matches the murder weapon. Because the police did the tests and said, oh, well, look at this, it's a match. Also in the backpack was a handwritten notebook filled with complaints about for profit health care, including a plan to, quote, whack a health insurance executive at an annual conference. And it was detailed, right in detailed about when Brian Thompson was going to be walking in a certain door, what time the conference starts, what a message it would send. Right?
- [07:18]
What the police did not lay their hands on in that McDonald's was a search warrant. I hear you. I can hear you. I'm with you as well. It isn't always a must, right? It's not always necessary when somebody's arrested. In fact, I see that more often than not your bag in your pockets, they get searched. No warrant, right? Safety. The officer. Are you packing? Have you got something in there that could hurt us? Or maybe we just need to know what you're carrying. So if you get carted off to jail, we have an inventory of your stuff. Yeah, but team Luigi claims that the circumstances in Altoona required a warrant and that without a warrant, nothing that Luigi had on his person or in that backpack can be used against him.
- [08:03]
I'm thinking through it live as we speak. Why are you special? Why is altoona and the McDonald's, why is that special? I watch on Patrol Live OPL. Every single person that they pull over and search, they go through their bag, they go through their pockets, and they always see the good Stuff out on the hood of the cruiser, right? No warrants. Usually it's for the officer safety.
- [08:28]
And again, they do an inventory of everything they take out of your purse, your backpack, your gym bag, whatever else you got in that, you know, vehicle. They don't always search the vehicle without a warrant. Usually they bring the dog around, and when the dog alerts, then that's probable cause. You don't need a warrant. You just search it right then and there. But I talked to somebody inside that courtroom and another person who says Luigi is gearing up for a plea deal more likely than anything else. But before I get to that, I just want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for humoring me. Always, like, watching me, you know, mentally do gymnastics as I go through these cases. And the evidence, it's the support I can't do without on this podcast. And I also want to thank my sponsors, like Incogni. Let's face it, I cover some pretty dark stuff, right? But some of the darkest and scariest is right there, quietly happening behind your screen. Your name and your phone and your number and your home address, all floating out there online. And it ain't because you gave it to anybody. It's because somebody sold it. Data brokers. That's what they're called. And they track you. They know what you buy. They know what you search. They know what meds you take. They know where your kid goes to school. And now with AI, it's like handing a loaded weapon to a scammer. One phone call, and suddenly you're worried that you're gonna have to wire money to somebody who sounds like your child or your mom. All right, it's chilling stuff, but here's what most people don't know. You have the right, legally, to make the data brokers delete your info. Trouble is, chasing them, it could take years to find them all. And that is why I use Incogni. They do all that dirty work for me. They go right to these companies and they demand that they remove my personal data. They can do it for you, too. They even offer a custom plan, unlimited. You flag a site that's exposing your info, Incogni's privacy team goes right after it directly. So this isn't just peace of mind. This is, like, power. If privacy matters to you, and it should go to incogni.com drop dead and use the code Drop dead. Because I got you 60% off. Again, incogni.com drop dead and use the code Drop dead. And start taking your data off the Market today. Okay, back to Luigi in court today. Earlier on my NewsNation show, I talked to Eric you, Yuba Lacker. He is the New York City courts reporter for Courthouse News. And I had so much to ask him about Luigi's day in court. First and foremost, the reaction when. I'm always curious about when Luigi walks into a court hearing. And I don't say that for the prurience of it. I say it because he's amassed a following of millions of fans. Some of them show up in person to be there in the courtroom to lay eyes on him in person. So what was the reaction when he walked in wearing a suit for the first time?
- [11:15]
Eric Ubilakar
Well, let's be clear. The people that made it to court today in support of him were likely very, very tired. There were camps, tents set up outside of the courthouse for pretty much the entire Thanksgiving weekend for people hoping and praying to get inside. Court officers did a very nice job of not letting the spectacle of this case interfere with the proceedings of the day. There was no audible gasp or anything when he walked in. There really hasn't been in any of the appearances that I've been at, but it was a little bit different. He didn't walk up the center of the aisle of the courtroom as he normally does. He came out from the holding cell in the back. So there was kind of even less of an opportunity. But as you noted, it was the first time we've seen him in this particular getup. He was not shackled for the entirety of the court hearing and he used his hands throughout the hearing. He took copious notes, pages of notes from what I saw, and was pretty intently watching a lot of the evidence on the screen.
- [12:12]
Ashley Banfield
So, Eric, I'm not going to lie. I watch a lot of court proceedings. I didn't expect a five day hearing on suppression of evidence. It's really, really long for those of us in the business, maybe a day or two, but for five whole days. Is it too early to score on day one?
- [12:30]
Eric Ubilakar
I think it is, especially because we're looking at it at least five days. I would guess we're expecting maybe around 30 witnesses in total, including a couple of defense witnesses sprinkled in there. Today we got to just five after kind of a late start for some technical difficulties. So, yeah, it's still very, very early. The judge has made no rulings. It's important to note that these kinds of hearings are pretty much all a net gain for the defense. You know, any evidence that they could get suppressed, even if it's not much at all or none at all. It's more than they had suppressed, you know, last week or the week before. So this is all for the benefit of the defendant, Luigi, in this case. And even if they get no evidence suppressed whatsoever, some of the defense lawyers that I talked to noted just how important this is to kind of plan. They can see how some of these prospective witnesses are going to testify at trial. They have the opportunity to cross examine them first before they have to sit in front of the jury. So there's a lot that they can learn even without the whole suppression aspect here.
- [13:31]
Ashley Banfield
It's like a poker game, I like to say. And they get to see the hand of the opposing player and plan accordingly. And that is like money for defense attorneys. Right. Cause otherwise you're tap dancing live during trial, wondering, what's the prosecution gonna come at? Me, look, I know that they get discovery, but it's not the same as strategy. So strategy's always super critical. Okay, I wanna talk a little bit about something else that's not getting as many headlines, and that is the gun in the backpack and the manifesto are all really big. But there's all these statements that Luigi apparently was making, for lack of a better description. It kind of sounds like he was singing like a canary when he was in his holding cells in Altoon while in Pennsylvania. But also I think when he got to New York, possibly too. And there were guards that were assigned to watch him like a hawk. I think the one expression was, we don't want an Epstein style situation, meaning, wow, we don't want this high profile guy to take his life. So he's going to be watched by somebody, you know, nonstop. And the somebodies were guards who were up on the stand today saying, yeah, that guy liked to talk, and he talked a lot. What did he talk about?
- [14:38]
Eric Ubilakar
Well, that. That was definitely the most interesting part of today was the testimony from the two corrections guards who kept constant watch over him. Because as you said, he's a high profile defendant. And as one of the guards said, we don't want an Epstein like situation happening. Pretty shocking thing to hear an open court in a case like this. But the first guard, the one who made that comment, he's an ex British combat veteran. I believe he was in the British infantry. He seemed to kind of genuinely enjoy talking to Luigi. Last December, just for the 10 days that he was locked up in Pennsylvania before he was extradited. You know, he said that they talked about things like travel, like literature, even talked about health care. At one point, he Said he didn't remember specifically Luigi saying anything one way or the other about health care. But he said that he offered his own opinion. Now, when the defense pressed him, the corrections officer, for his own opinion today, he said he couldn't recall it, so didn't get much out of that. But, yeah, I mean, he made it out to seem like, you know, Luigi was here in this cell all day, every day. He was separated probably 2, 3ft from the guard between the Plexiglas wall that he was behind. And they talked for a majority of the day. The second corrections officer seems like he was agitated to be in court, which were his direct words. He answered one word answers all day, said he had no interest in talking to Luigi, and that everything that Luigi told him was just off the cuff. He didn't ask him anything. We'll see what the judge thinks about that and whether or not he'll take that as admissible. But it's a very key issue for the defense because the defense is trying to argue that these officers, in one way or another, coerced information out of him that could be used against him in these cases. And the guards are saying, no, he gave this to me voluntarily.
- [16:32]
Ashley Banfield
That's critical, right? Because Miranda goes so far. Right. You could be Mirandized, but if you decide to sing like a canary later, you don't get the benefit of protection from that. You gotta shut your cakehole. That's the whole. You have the right to remain silent. Mostly lawyers will say, I urge you to exercise it. So could Luigi's backpack actually be tossed from this case? And is there even a case, both state and federal, if the backpack goes away? Listen to what defense attorney and former prosecutor Mark Eiglarsch had to say. I had a long conversation with him on my NewsNation show. If the backpack goes away and the gun goes away and the manifesto goes away, Mark, do they have a case?
- [17:14]
Mark Eiglarsch
Yes, they do. They have a video. And with that, they have statements that they will likely be able to get into evidence. And let me have everybody just take a deep breath. The defense lawyers are doing what defense lawyers do to ensure due process. It doesn't mean that they actually have a legitimate claim to get this stuff suppressed. I'm predicting now that the judge is going to allow all the contents of the backpack to come in. The judge is going to allow the those statements to come into evidence and understand that the defense is merely ensuring that if he is convicted, there won't be an argument that they rendered ineffective assistance of counsel, meaning they did their Job. They challenged the evidence.
- [18:00]
Ashley Banfield
Five days worth of it, too. That's pretty effective if you ask me. Okay. I love police shows. I watch On Patrol live every weekend. I sometimes fill in as a host. And if there's one scene that I see repeated over and over in the field, it's police officers making a stop, detaining someone, putting said someone in cuffs, and searching their purse, backpack, and if the dog alerts the car. But let's stay away from the car for a minute and just talk about the purses and the backpacks and the pockets. Sometimes it's for the officer's safety, and others, it's sometimes for an inventory search to make sure that that detainee gets all of his or her stuff back. So how all of a sudden are these lawyers saying, oh, you can't do that. You can't search his backpack in the McDonald's.
- [18:42]
Mark Eiglarsch
The lawyers are saying that because that's their job. That's the same thing. I would argue it doesn't mean that they actually believe this will prevail. They just say it passionately, and it makes for a great sound bite. I don't see a judge or an appellate court, ultimately, when this is reviewed, saying that officers can be around someone's backpack, have no idea whether there's a bomb in there, and be able to sit back and say, you know what? That pesky Fourth Amendment, our forefathers fought and gave up their lives so I won't be able to look inside to ensure my safety is okay garbage. They're gonna allow that to happen all day long. And ultimately, even if the court finds that they should not have gone into that backpack, there's something called inevitable discovery. Eventually, they would have realized who this was, but place them under arrest, and then pursuant to arrest, they would have been able to search and inventory what's inside the backpack.
- [19:39]
Ashley Banfield
So what I'm gathering from you is that this is all adorable. They're not gonna prevail. That gun, that 3D printed gun, which is literally the smoking gun, if you believe the prosecutors. It matches the murder weapon and the manifesto that talks about going to that conference, trailing his schedule, talking about United Healthcare and that specific. I mean, it is just. It's almost like the blueprint. That why Mangioni was carrying it around with him, I will never understand. But you think that there's just. This is all just gonna be an adorable thing in the rearview mirror.
- [20:10]
Mark Eiglarsch
I wasn't gonna correct you when you said adorable once, but you said it twice. I don't agree that anything's adorable about this. I don't love that word. I will tell you, though, that you can't entertain a plea offer with a client like this. I've been there until he knows what type of evidence will be used against him. And until you challenge the evidence, you don't know what the case. Once all these defense motions are denied and then his attorneys have a come to Jesus discussion with them like, hey, dude, we're likely not gonna win this case. And oh, and by the way, you may get the death penalty in the federal arena. Maybe it's best if we kind of work all this out and you get life, which is what you deserve anyway.
- [20:55]
Ashley Banfield
Yeah, I hear you, and I feel the same way. I was just surprised at five full days of the court to go over these suppression hearings.
- [21:02]
Eric Ubilakar
Justice.
- [21:03]
Mark Eiglarsch
That's due process. That's okay. No, it's okay. It's due process. It's the Constitution working. Effective. There you go. It's not adorable, though. It's not adorable.
- [21:12]
Ashley Banfield
Okay, so now the hold your horses moment. Seriously, hold your effin horses. Because day two may actually give the judge some pause.
- [21:23]
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- [23:21]
Ashley Banfield
And I'm telling you, it really made me flip how I'm looking at this hearing, how I'm looking at this evidence suppression effort. Like I just thought, I can't believe they booked five days for this thing. Police always search people when they arrest them. They always do it just watch. On Patrol Live, you see it on every single stop. When they pull someone out of the car, they look through their pockets, they look through the bag, right? You don't get a warrant for that stuff. You just do it. It's standard. Now I get it. For all you folks out there who are, you know, really ensconced in the law or policing, there are exceptions to every rule. But generally speaking, cops search, you know, suspects or detainees and certainly those were, you know, being arrested and taken back to the huscow. They search them for their safety and they also search for inventory. Because if you're going to get taken to the who scout, you need to have an inventory of what was on your person and in your bag so that they can return it to you. And as Sean Stix Larkin tells me, because I asked him because he's like so great on On Patrol live, he said it's great when, you know, you come upon stuff during the inventory search. Always it's the drugs, it's the illegal paraphernalia. But at the center of Luigi's case on day two was the officer who cracked his case wide open. The same officer who walked into that Altuna McDonald's convinced that the manager had it all wrong when she called 911 saying, I think we got that, you know, Luigi Mangioni fella in my restaurant here and one of our customers is pretty sure that that's him eating the hash browns.
- [25:08]
So the officer's coming to the restaurant and he is like convinced this is such a waste of time. It's not going to be him. That, like, this famous murderer from New York is not going to be here in Altoona, Pennsylvania, five days after the killing. It's just somebody who got it wrong. It's not a hoax. Whatever. But it's just probably someone who got it wrong. And then the officer gets in the restaurant, he gets into McDonald's, and he takes one look at the guy who was slumped down in the McDonald's booth eating his hash browns, and he knew right away, that's him. He was so certain when he laid eyes on Mangione in court, he said, quote, on the body cam, it's him. It was him. Right? Not that Mangione admitted it, because he didn't at first. Like, Luigi was a total liar. He gave them a fake name and he handed over a fake id. Pro tip to y' all. Underagers who are using fake IDs. Do not give that to the police. If you ever are asked or stopped, that is a felony. Lying to the police, obstruction of justice. Don't do it dumb. Just don't get rid of the id. Give them your real id. If it's a police officer, never, ever, ever, ever, ever tell a lie. Okay, I'm done with the lessons for this moment. But the court, they saw everything play out in that McDonald's. Courtesy of Officer Joseph Detwiler's body cam. So that officer was first on the scene, and he made for a critical and singular witness in Luigi's evidence suppression hearing. Day two. One witness, but dang.
- [26:53]
He was a doozy. His body cam was the critical aspect of this hearing. And it showed a lot of math. It showed exactly 19 minutes of questions and answers happened before Luigi was read his Miranda rights. Doesn't mean you're not allowed to have any questions and answers when you get onto a scene. Because no cop shows up on a scene and says, hello, you have the right to remain silent. That's not how it works. It's usually, hi, there. What's your name? What's going on here? Lady over here says, do have any id, Sir? Can I see some id? That's how policing usually works. You don't read people their Miranda rights right away. But there is a critical time. There is an important time. It's a gray area. It's very flowy. Yeah. And every defendant will fight the gray area. Right, But I mean, 19 minutes, so, yeah, that's getting there. That's long, right? It's a long time. The body cam showed Luigi being frisked through multiple layers of his winter clothes. And it also showed that Warrantless search of his backpack, which is like one of the biggest reasons that we're in this hearing that we're in right now. His statements when he's not Mirandized, and the backpack. That's why day two was so important to me, because it's all about the timing. If you're scared as you're going to look through that pack, like, really soon, like, real quick, you're going to look through the backpack. But they didn't do that. They left quite a long time between arriving on scene, recognizing it's Luigi, the supposed executioner from Manhattan. Allegedly. Right. Dangerous guy. And there's a backpack, and they know there was a gun used. And the cop even thinks there may be a gun in the backpack. So the math matters. How many minutes did it take? How long was your fear appropriate to warrant a warrantless search? So back to walk me through how all of this played out inside the courtroom is Eric Ubilakar with Courthouse News. And this is the conversation about day two. The body cam surprised me, Eric. I'm not going to lie. I really. I didn't expect. Yeah, I'll tell you what I didn't expect. I love to do timing. As you probably heard at the beginning of the show. I asked people to time the break that we're about to have. And I was really surprised to hear the timing of arrival, identification. Worried about backpack and what could be in it, because this allegedly is an executioner who doesn't seem to have a problem with shooting people on the sidewalk. And then ultimately Miranda and my math had two seconds. You know, that's the testimony of the cop. I knew it was him in two seconds. And then 13 minutes before they go, ooh, let's maybe separate him from that dangerous backpack. And then 19 minutes before Miranda, that's me. But you were in court. You tell me what stood out to you about today.
- [29:53]
Eric Ubilakar
I don't think that that's inaccurate at all. I mean, we learned a lot about the Altoona PD today. And what we learned is that there are 65, 70 cops. It's not a big city, it's no NYPD, and they don't deal with high profile cases like this all the time. I'm sure Officer Ditwiler was just as surprised as perhaps all of we are that Mangian ended up in his town, assuming, of course, that he is the shooter. It's still all alleged.
- [30:19]
So, yeah, I mean, you could hear the surprise in his voice on the body cam footage. And that was something that kind of stuck out to us as he stepped outside of the McDonald's for a minute, left his partner in with Mr. Mr. Mangione. And he told his supervisor, I'm 100% sure it's him. And you could kind of hear how shocked he was. So I don't think it's the most surprising thing in the world that, you know, he wasn't perhaps as equipped to deal with this as if the NYPD found him, you know, right there in midtown, let's say.
- [30:48]
Ashley Banfield
Yeah, I still think they did kind of everything by the book. I was just surprised at how long it took for them to separate him from his backpack, because, again, I like to watch cop shows, but I like the real ones, not the. Not the dramas. I like on Patrol Live, which shows how police patrol in real time, and what they do when they have a suspect either detained or arrested. And immediately they search their pockets and they search their bags, and usually it's for officer safety. And then I talked to Sean Stix Larkin the other day. He's, like the star of that show, other than Dan Abrams. And he said they do it for inventory. You know, basically logging inventory. If that person's going back to the jail, they can give you back all your stuff if they inventory it. But isn't it great that during inventory, you find all the goodies? So I was curious, though, about Luigi's reactions to all of this. Is he cool as a cucumber, or does he seem to know everything that's going on? Is he surprised by anything? Is he smirking?
- [31:47]
Eric Ubilakar
Well, he was much more expressive yesterday. He was very stoic when he was watching the body cam footage, when he was watching himself be frisked, which, by the way, did. They didn't search the backpack for several minutes, but they did frisk Luigi right away, which is why it was so surprising that, you know, a jar of peanut butter turned up in his jacket minutes later when they did a full inventory. But still. But no, Luigi in court today was not nearly as expressive as he was yesterday. When we heard some of the testimony from the corrections officers that he had conversations with, he mostly just sat down in his defense chair, leaned back, sometimes had his hands on his face, and was looking up at one of the two monitors that are in front of him. You know, we saw the video of the killing. Again, did not have much of a reaction at all that I could see. We saw the entirety of the body cam footage. We saw it from multiple different angles. Not much of a reaction from him at the defense table.
- [32:44]
Ashley Banfield
Let's talk A little bit more about that peanut butter because that also had me a little flummoxed today. Maybe he thought, I'm going to be on the run for a while. I might not want to go into a restaurant or anywhere where there's cameras, but I do need protein and I don't want to be hungry, and I like peanut butter. So he had the jar of peanut butter on his person. He had three layers of clothing, which also interesting. He's on the run, maybe doesn't want to have a lot of luggage, just a small backpack. So he wore most of his clothes. He had a knife, maybe for the peanut butter. He had a piece of string, which was interesting. A blue and white wallet. Not weird. And lots and lots of money. Eric Evil Aquer. He had a couple thousand, including foreign currency. Did they make much hay of all of those contents?
- [33:27]
Eric Ubilakar
They really didn't. That kind of came up towards the end today. I'm not sure how much we're going to get into that. I, for one, was surprised how much American currency he had on his person because we've all been reading for weeks in court filings that they did recover that foreign currency, and we made a lot of it. I did not expect rows of $100 bills, several thousand dollars all in hundreds with just a small stack of foreign currency that I couldn't identify from where I was sitting. So that was very surprising. The peanut butter, your guess is as good as mine. One interesting tidbit from today is when they were asking Luigi questions about himself back when he was still giving them the false name Mark Rosario, he did actually say they asked him for his address and he said, I'm homeless. And, you know, at first glance, that could be a lie, but also it could be true given the fact that his family didn't entirely know where he was at the time. You know, even, let's just say, hypothetically, he wasn't in New York that day. We don't really know where he was in the years between him going to college, him traveling to the events that took place up to his arrest. So that was kind of an interesting note that we didn't really think about. You know, he could genuinely have been on the move and prepared to not have shelter for a while, hence the peanut butter, all the clothes, the bags, things like that.
- [34:46]
Kerrygold Butter Advertiser
Yeah.
- [34:47]
Ashley Banfield
Let me ask you this real quickly. This was another thing that was surprising to me, and please correct me if I'm wrong here. They were able to elicit in court that the police officers who responded at least one of them turned his body cam off, I think twice. Once inside the restaurant and once on the way to the jail with Luigi in the back. I might be missing something in there, but let me know. And also why. And was this a huge issue for the defense, that they turned their body cams off temporarily?
- [35:16]
Eric Ubilakar
Well, as far as I know, that's always a huge issue that the defense can latch onto. It's not entirely uncommon. I believe the body cam rules kind of vary from the department to department. So, you know, this. We'll see how fruitful this is for them. But, yeah, that is something that the defense brought up today. They really wanted to know what was being said during that downtime when the body cam was turned off. And what the officer said on the stand was, you know, it's typical for us to turn it off when we're not around the suspect, when we're not doing police work or, you know, sometimes if we're talking about things like strategy or how to approach things, you know, from a law enforcement perspective as to not kind of give that away publicly. So that's what he said was going on. He said he doesn't remember what he said at the time, though.
- [36:03]
Ashley Banfield
Eric Ubilakar, you are good at your job, and I'm so glad that you agreed to come on with us. I hope you'll do it again. Thank you for this.
- [36:10]
Eric Ubilakar
Thank you so much.
- [36:11]
Kerrygold Butter Advertiser
Bye. Bye.
- [36:11]
Ashley Banfield
So does all of this body cam and all that math, right, all the timing, does it change anything legally in Luigi's fight to have those critical contents of the backpack, the gun, the manifesto, peanut butter, who cares? Does it matter to having it thrown out of the case? Because remember, the gun in the manifesto inside that backpack? You could argue they are the entire case. Right? So for that part of this, I tapped one of the best defense attorneys out there, Alexandra Kazarian from Garagos and Garagos. And here's our conversation. The two things that stood out to me, as I just mentioned with Eric, were that the cop said, I knew it was him within two seconds. And first of all, you know, it's this. This, you know, if you think it's a guy who executes people on the street, damn, that guy's got to be dangerous. And then Also, it took 13 minutes from arrival of the cops to separate him from the bag at his feet, which, you know, ostensibly could have a gun. What did you make of that? As a defense attorney? Is this very problematic for the state in keeping the search of the backpack.
- [37:22]
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- [38:22]
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- [39:22]
Alexandra Kazarian
Oh yeah, I think that's a problem because you either know that it's him and you know that there's an immediate threat and you have to come in and secure the area, or you're not sure that it's him. And in that situation, what could they have done in that 13 minutes or that 17 minutes before they Mirandized him to determine that this was Luigi? How did they they're going to have to tell us how in that 17 minutes they determined that those eyebrows were really Luigi's. And I don't hear any, I don't hear any information coming in that 17 minutes that says they locked it down, they knew that this was the guy. Exactly. It all was a fishing expedition. And that's why they waited 17 minutes to give him his Miranda rights, because they did not know it was him. So they didn't know that that backpack was dangerous. And, yeah, I think it's a huge issue.
- [40:12]
Ashley Banfield
So the Miranda, for me, and again, I'm a bit of an idiot when it comes to this, the Miranda is not as big a deal for me as the warrantless search of the backpack, because the backpack has the gun and the manifold festo, which is literally the case with a beautiful Christmas bow on top of it. And so if there's any possibility they can throw this backpack search out of the case, you know, I think it's a more worrisome case. Not necessarily game over, but I think it's more worrisome for the prosecutors, everybody else. Up until today, and this timing issue was saying, this is just pro forma. You're just protecting the record. You're just making sure this isn't ineffective assistance of counsel. You're just making sure there's not going to be an effective appeal. And then today, all this timing made me concerned. Do you truly believe that 10 minutes before you actually get that backpack away from him is enough to say you weren't too scared of what was in that backpack to require an emergency search of that backpack without a warrant? You weren't too scared. Therefore, you had to have a warrant.
- [41:16]
Alexandra Kazarian
So this is why our legal system is beautiful, right? Because we have 12 jurors that are going to have opinions on the evidence and sometimes 12 different ways. And, you know, I think that Miranda not mirandizing him for 17 minutes and talking to him, there is a huge issue. And if you were on the jury, you would be stuck on that backpack. And I do. I think that the. The police are. Are giving the prosecution the problem of having to argue two inconsistent theories. And there is law that says that the prosecution cannot argue two different theories of prosecution. So that's one of the questions. And I know I'm getting into the weeds here, but this is going to get very, very complicated. And there are going to be arguments that the defense is going to make that are going to be foreign and hard to follow. But the prosecution cannot argue both that they were in imminent fear, the officers, and that they needed to wait to figure out what was going on. That is exactly the issue. And that's why we have lay people on the jury instead of professionals. Because even though you don't know the law you've honed in on. The actual exact issue is that how can you forego his constitutional rights to be free of illegal search and seizure without a warrant if you are not scared enough to take that backpack within minutes. Within seconds.
- [42:41]
Ashley Banfield
So I have. I have 20 seconds left. But I have to ask you the question. I don't think it matters, but it was just weird. They did not keep the food wrappers. They didn't keep the food wrappers from Mangione's food that he was eating. Does it matter?
- [42:55]
Alexandra Kazarian
Well, if you have a juror on the. On the jury that says, where's the DNA? How do we know that the DNA. How do we know that that was him? How do we know that that was him at the scene? And how do we know that that Was him at McDonald's? At MacDonald's?
- [43:07]
Ashley Banfield
Sorry.
- [43:10]
That'S what? Texas. That's the Texas. I spent five years in Texas, and I always call it the McDonald's.
- [43:14]
Alexandra Kazarian
I could not be on here without. Without making a little. Little poking a little fun. But, yeah, I think that if you have a juror that cares about DNA and that says we're in a. We're in a world where we know that DNA is available, that's going to be an issue.
- [43:28]
Ashley Banfield
Yeah, I'm super frustrated by this, Right. Because on one hand, I hate it when there's evidence that a jury can't see. Right. I hate it when jurors aren't given the full picture. I have interviewed jurors. I've done stories on jurors who are so angry after they get outside their case, and they're allowed to read the media and they find out all the stuff that they weren't allowed to know, and they rendered a verdict they wish they hadn't. I get it. But I also. I have to say, I really appreciate American jurisprudence. I appreciate the protections that were given. Because, may I just tell you, before true crime, I was also a war correspondent. And so I hopscotched all over the fucking world. And I went to places that I couldn't wait to leave. Mostly because I thought I might die, you know, either by stray bullets or the government locking me away. I mean, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, and then everything east of the Carpathians. I've been there, and in so many of those places, I just remember thinking, thank Jesus we live in the US it ain't perfect where we live, but it's a hell of a lot more perfect than there. You know, that's hooded justice off to the Gulag. Your parents and your family will never know where you went, and they'll never see you again. Done. Don't ask questions. That's justice elsewhere. And so when you get frustrated by these suppression hearings because maybe the police didn't follow exactly the orders of what our Constitution guarantees us in our freedoms and our rights, don't get pissed. Just realize it's there for us. It's there for the innocent. It's there for you and me. God forbid something should rope you into something you had nothing to do with. And it fucking happens. Trust me, I have covered enough good guys railroaded into the system only after decades of serving time, you know, to be oopsied, Sorry, gotta let you out. DNA clears you, as does the Innocence Project. So these things that are annoying and frustrating and sometimes limit evidence that you. You know is real, you know, it's there. I can see with my own eyes. And the body cam, it's there for us. On the other side of that, I am also buoyed by me.
- [46:01]
People in the media, and I like it because we can tell the stories that are real stories, and they have nothing to do with jurisprudence or process or anything. We can just tell you the stories.
- [46:17]
And if you are a juror, you come in with your street knowledge. If you have followed the Luigi Mangioni case, you know this shit has happened. You know he was caught with a backpack. You know There was a 3D printed gun in a manifesto saying, yeah, I'm gonna follow that fucker to the insurance conference at 6am I have his schedule. What a message would that send My words. But I'm paraphrasing. And so you come in with that wisdom. You may be looking around the courtroom saying, now, why the hell they not showing me that backpack right now? Because I know it existed. I followed that story for the two years before the trial. And they say things like, you're not allowed to consider anything you haven't seen right here in the case, but you're no dummy. Yeah, you know, you're no dummy. You come with your knowledge baggage packed as a juror. And that stuff gets in your DNA and in your gut, even if you're told to disregard. Right? So it's why I'm happy you're listening to this podcast right now. It's why I hope you will tell all your friends to listen to it and watch it. Because I think people should be.
- [47:29]
They should be schooled, they should be knowledgeable, they should be aware. It's your civic duty to be A good, informed citizen. Right? And so these things will be known, maybe they'll be suppressed at trial, but it ain't like they aren't known. Right? So in that respect, I think it's kind of like the. You know, it's like the bargain that we make as a society. You cannot suppress all information. In this society, you can do your level best to suppress what you think maybe didn't follow procedure, but we know it. We know it. It's why they probably will never pick me as a juror. That, and I'm not in New York, but you know it too. So that's where things stand with Luigi Mangione. A man fighting to erase the very evidence prosecutors say ties him to a cold blooded execution on a Manhattan sidewalk. And I know half of you out there. I don't know, maybe it's not half, but a lot of you out there, you're. You're there for Luigi. I. I understand what you're saying. I get it. I have spoken to many of you, many of you at CrimeCon. You feel, and I hear you, that healthcare executives are making decisions that are causing our deaths. They're limiting coverage. They're making it too expensive. They're. They're putting it out of our reach. There's dilatory tactics that delay things and we die. And many of you have said, well, that's just like legal killing. So Luigi was trying to bring that up and spare us from it. I totally hear that argument, but I take the other side. Only because we live in a nation of laws. Thank you, Jesus. We live here. I have lived in other countries. I have worked in other countries where law is sort of subjective and it kind of sometimes happens, but usually not. And living in countries where the law of the land doesn't reign supreme is no place you want to be. You want to live where the law has your back. It's not perfect. I know. I get it. But generally, we're the best in the business. All around the globe. We are the envy of the world, our legal system, and so I prefer to live within it. I don't think we should be like, carrying out vigilante justice, because my politics or my thoughts or my theories are this way and they're against yours. Not up to me to be the judge, jury, and executioner. We set up a system for it, and it works. For the most part, it works better than everywhere else. We're going to be watching every move inside Luigi's New York courtroom this week, so make sure you're subscribed. So you don't miss the very next twist and whatever else he's going to pull out of that hat. Also, if you haven't yet seen this, I just dropped an episode on Carla Homoca and Paul Bernardo. It's in the description and I just want you to know it is a case that launched me on my career towards true crime. It's my first and it remains the worst. And when I say that, it still affects me to this day, almost 40 years later. So I have finally taken pen to paper and we put out this episode. They're called the Ken and Barbie Killers and a lot of people have talked about them, but not that many people covered them like I did. And not so many people have anecdotes about things that were happening at the time and how it affected our careers. AKA I'm drop dead serious. I do this job now and that was my first. I'm Ashley Banfield. Thank you so much for listening and watching. And remember, the truth isn't just serious, it's drop dead serious.
- [51:13]
Eric Ubilakar
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Ashley Banfield
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Eric Ubilakar
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- [51:43]
Kerrygold Butter Advertiser
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- [52:09]
Ashley Banfield
What do you think makes the perfect snack? Hmm, it's gotta be when I'm really craving it and it's convenient. Could you be more specific when it's cravenient. Okay, like a freshly baked cookie made with real butter, available right down the street at am, pm. Or a savory breakfast sandwich I can grab in just a second at a.m. pM. I'm seeing a pattern here.
- [52:26]
Eric Ubilakar
Well yeah, we're talking about what I.
- [52:28]
Ashley Banfield
Crave, which is anything from am, pm. What more could you want?
- [52:31]
Eric Ubilakar
Stop by AMPM where the snacks and drinks are perfectly craveable and convenient. That's cravenience am PM Too much good stuff.