BBQ fork and pizza cutter: the bizarre plot to break Luigi Mangione out of jail

New York: A Minnesota man has been accused of impersonating an FBI agent to attempt freeing accused health insurance CEO killer Luigi Mangione from a Brooklyn prison, while carrying a barbecue fork and a pizza-cutter blade, court records show.

Mangione, 27, is awaiting trial in a death penalty murder case on charges that he gunned down the CEO of UnitedHealth Group, Brian Thompson, in Manhattan in 2024.

Public officials condemned the shocking killing but Mangione became a folk hero to some Americans who decry steep healthcare costs and insurance company practices. He has pleaded not guilty to murder and other charges in separate state and federal cases.

Brooklyn federal prosecutors on Wednesday, New York time, accused Mark Anderson, 36, of Mankato, Minnesota, of showing up at the Metropolitan Detention Centre at about 6.50pm and telling prison staff he was an FBI agent with paperwork signed by a judge authorising the release of an inmate.

The criminal complaint does not identify the inmate, but a law enforcement source, who was not authorised to speak publicly, said it was Mangione.

Prosecutors said Anderson provided his Minnesota driver’s licence when asked to show credentials and told prison guards he had weapons.

Guards arrested and searched Anderson and found a barbecue fork and a round pizza-cutter blade in his backpack, according to the complaint.

Anderson was working at a pizzeria after arriving in New York, the law enforcement source said.

He threw documents at the guards that appeared to be unspecified claims against the US Department of Justice, according to the complaint.

In a lawsuit last year alleging injuries from a fall at a city homeless shelter, Anderson said he had “multiple disabilities” and had been ruled by the Social Security Administration to be “fully disabled because of mental illness”. He said he had no money and said he received state and federal assistance.

According to public records, Anderson has had numerous drug and alcohol-related arrests and convictions over the past two decades in his native Minnesota and in Wisconsin, where he has also lived.

Acting as his own lawyer in the past, he has filed handwritten lawsuits against the Pentagon, Chinese and Russian ambassadors and a Minnesota police department, all of which have been thrown out. Another lawsuit, alleging a Bronx pizzeria forced him to work 70 hours a week with no overtime, is still pending.

Anderson was ordered jailed without bail after an initial appearance on Thursday (New York time) in Brooklyn federal court. He was not required to enter a plea. Information on a legal representative for Anderson was not immediately available.

Mangione, a 27-year-old Ivy League graduate from a wealthy Maryland family, was arrested at a McDonald’s in Pennsylvania in December 2024 after a five-day manhunt that followed Thompson’s murder. Police say they found a 3D-printed handgun, a silencer and a note criticising the US healthcare system in his backpack.

Mangione’s pretrial hearings have been packed with spectators, many of whom voice support for him, and demonstrators have gathered outside courthouses to protest against health insurance industry practices.

Some have donned green clothing – the colour worn by the Mario Bros video game character Luigi – as a symbol of solidarity, and some have brought signs and shirts with slogans such as “Free Luigi” and “No Death For Luigi Mangione”.

The alleged attempt to free Mangione added a bizarre wrinkle to a critical stretch in his legal cases.

He is tentatively set to stand trial in Manhattan federal court in September on charges of murder with a firearm, use of a firearm in a crime and stalking.

Mangione’s lawyers have asked a judge to either throw out the indictment over alleged legal deficiencies or to block prosecutors from seeking the death penalty if he is convicted.

Mangione has pleaded not guilty to murder, weapons and forgery charges in a separate case in state court in Manhattan. No trial date has been set.

The notorious Metropolitan Detention Centre is also home to former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, who are facing drug-trafficking charges. Its former inmates include hip-hop mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs and cryptocurrency fraudster Sam Bankman-Fried.

Reuters, AP

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