(NEW YORK) — Luigi Mangione returned to court in New York City Thursday for a sixth day of a hearing to determine what evidence will, or will not, be used against him when he goes on trial on charges of gunning down UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson on a Manhattan sidewalk last December.

The day began with an argument by the defense that prosecutors were trying to “prejudice Mr. Mangione” by releasing CCTV footage that showed the killing of Thompson and the aftermath, in which the suspect is seen running across the street as bystanders point in the suspect’s direction.

The defense argued prosecutors had no reason to include the footage in the suppression hearing and accused them of using it as a “vehicle to litigate their case in the court of public opinion” and to “distract from the botched arrest” of Mangione.

Judge Gregory Carro agreed the video is not at issue in the suppression hearing, but said, “We deal with it the way we deal with all the press this case has gotten: in jury selection.”

Prosecutors with the Manhattan district attorney’s office are calling to stand supervisory police officers present at the Altoona, Pennsylvania, McDonald’s where Mangione was apprehended after customers thought they recognized the suspect wanted in New York due to his distinctive eyebrows. 

Lt. William Hanelly, the highest-ranking officer present at the McDonald’s where Luigi Mangione was arrested, testified that he called 911 in New York City on his way to the scene “so we could get the ball rolling.”

“We’re acting off a tip from a local business here,” Hanelly is heard saying on a recording played in court.  “We might have the shooter.”

Hanelly is then heard clarifying, “The shooter from the UHC,” referring to United Healthcare by its initials. Hanelly also says that the individual at the McDonald’s “matches the photos that your department put out.”

Mangione listened from the defense table as the previously unheard phone call played in the courtroom.

Hanelly stayed on the phone as he arrived at the McDonald’s and the call captured him asking one of his subordinates, “Did you pat him down?”

“At that point we had reasonable suspicion to believe he had been involved in a crime of violence in another jurisdiction,” Hanelly testified.  “He could be armed and dangerous.”

Hanelly said he had heard the initial call over the radio dispatching patrolman Joseph Detwiler to the McDonald’s and Detwiler’s “fairly sarcastic” response.   Hanelly testified that while “it seemed preposterous” to him a shooting suspect from a New York City homicide had found his way to Altoona, but texted Detwiler “a gentle reminder” to treat the possibility seriously.

The supervisors, a sergeant and two corporals, briefly were overheard on body camera footage debating whether officers needed a warrant to conduct more than a cursory search of Mangione’s backpack, from which police were seen on the footage retrieving the alleged murder weapon, writings, and a note that prosecutors said mentioned “escape routes.”

Defense attorneys say the lack of a warrant made the search and seizure illegal, and they are seeking to preclude the contents of the bag.

They also argue officers were too late reading Mangione his Miranda rights and continued to pepper him with questions after he indicated he preferred to remain silent. 

The officers have testified that they lawfully searched Mangione’s backpack pursuant to his arrest for showing them a fake ID, and said they were legitimately concerned Mangione may have had a weapon or explosive. 

The officers also testified their questions to Mangione’s about his fake ID and whether his bag contained anything harmful were appropriate under the circumstances. 

Prosecutors are expected to rest next week. Judge Gregory Carro is expected to issue a written decision about the evidence sometime in January.

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(NEW YORK) — A federal judge has ordered the immediate release of Kilmar Abrego Garcia from immigration detention.

U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis said in her order Thursday that “since Abrego Garcia’s wrongful detention in El Salvador, he has been re-detained, again without lawful authority.”

Xinis said that the absence of a removal order prevents the government from removing Abrego Garcia from the United States.

Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran native who had been living in Maryland with his wife and children, was deported in March to El Salvador’s CECOT mega-prison — despite a 2019 court order barring his deportation to that country due to fear of persecution — after the Trump administration claimed he was a member of the criminal gang MS-13, which he denies.

He was brought back to the U.S. in June to face human smuggling charges in Tennessee, to which he has pleaded not guilty.

After being released into the custody of his brother in Maryland pending trial, he was again detained by immigration authorities and is currently being held in a detention facility in Pennsylvania.

Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said in a social media post following the ruling, “This is naked judicial activism by an Obama appointed judge. This order lacks any valid legal basis and we will continue to fight this tooth and nail in the courts.”

Last month, the federal government — seeking to deport Abrego Garcia to the West African nation of Liberia — asked Xinis to dissolve a ban on his removal to that country, saying it had received assurances from the Liberian government that he would not be persecuted or tortured should he be deported there.

In her order Thursday, Judge Xinis directed the government to notify Abrego Garcia of the exact time and location of his release and to notify the court no later than 5 p.m. ET today.

In the 31-page order granting Abrego Garcia’s habeas petition, Xinis detailed Abrego Garcia’s removal to El Salvador, his return to the U.S. to face criminal charges, and his re-detention in immigration custody.

“The circumstances of Abrego Garcia’s detention since he was released from criminal custody cannot be squared with the ‘basic purpose’ of holding him to effectuate removal,” Xinis said.

Xinis, citing reporting from ABC News and others, said the government at the same time could have removed Abrego Garcia to Costa Rica, his preferred country of removal.

“Respondents’ calculated effort to take Costa Rica ‘off the table’ backfired,” Xinis wrote. “Within 24 hours, Costa Rica, through Minister Zamora Cordero, communicated to multiple news sources that its offer to grant Abrego Garcia residence and refugee status is, and always has been, firm, unwavering, and unconditional.”

“Respondents serially ‘notified’ Abrego Garcia — while he sat in ICE custody — of his expulsion to Uganda, then Eswatini, then Ghana; but none of these countries were ever viable options,” Xinis wrote.

The judge said Abrego Garcia will receive instruction from the United States Pretrial Services Office on the release conditions previously imposed in his criminal case.

Xinis in August blocked the government from removing Abrego Garcia from the United States until the habeas case challenging his removal was resolved in court.

“The history of Abrego Garcia’s case is as well known as it is extraordinary,” Xinis wrote in her decision Thursday.

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(WASHINGTON) — A report prepared by Democratic members of Congress says the Pentagon has diverted at least $2 billion of its own funds to support the Trump administration’s immigration operations, negatively impacting what they say is the U.S. military’s readiness.

Separately, a response from Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to questions posed by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., that was shared with ABC News disclosed that two major military exercises were canceled this year and a third was scaled back as a result of the deployment of military forces to immigration operations.

Caine said that both the “Vibrant Response” exercise scheduled for April and May, as well as a rotation by the 10th Mountain Division at the Joint Readiness Training Center at Fort Polk, Louisiana, over the summer were canceled because of the deployment.

The large-scale national “Ardent Sentry” exercise in March that U.S. Northern Command uses to train responses to chemical, radiological, biological and nuclear incidents was also “Descoped” according to Caine’s response.

In a statement to ABC News about the report, the Pentagon said with a $1 trillion budget it’s able to carry out multiple missions simultaneously.

Compiled from open source information and reprogramming requests made by the Pentagon to Congress, the review of Pentagon border funding by Democrats in Congress found that $1.3 billion of that amount had been diverted to pay for the deployment of troops and resources to the Southwest border with Mexico.

The report cited a Pentagon request to Congress in late May to reprogram $200 million in funds approved for worldwide military construction projects to construct a 30-foot-high steel bollard barrier along a 20-mile stretch of the border near Yuma, Arizona.

The diverted funds were originally slated to pay for the construction of new military facilities, including military housing, and two elementary schools run by the DOD’s Education Activity (DODEA) at Fort Knox, Kentucky, and Stuttgart, Germany.

The deployment of active duty forces to the Southwest Border began in January shortly after the start of President Donald Trump’s second term with more than 7,000 personnel assigned to support federal law enforcement agencies operating along the border.

Since April, the Trump administration has designated military zones covering large swaths of the border where U.S. forces have the authority to temporarily detain any migrants trespassing what are now considered to be extensions of military bases.

On Wednesday, the Interior Department announced that a fourth National Defense Area had been established along California’s border with Mexico. Previous NDA designations stretched along the border in Arizona, New Mexico and Texas.

The Democrats’ review found that the high-profile deployment of federalized National Guard and active-duty troops to Los Angeles; Chicago; Portland, Oregon; and Memphis, Tennessee, has cost at least $258 million.

At least $420 million was diverted to assist with the detention of immigrants at military bases in the United States as well as overseas bases at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba and Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti, according to the report.

The review found that least $40.3 million has been spent on paying for the U.S. military flights used to deport and transport migrants back to their home countries instead of using the cheaper flights contracted by the Department of Homeland Security.

“This is a baffling waste of military resources considering the appropriation of $170 billion to DHS to fund immigration enforcement earlier this year,” said the report. It added that the information used to compile the report indicated that “the vast majority of these funds have not been reimbursed by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), to date.”

“We are particularly concerned that DHS may not be reimbursing DoD for these funds,” a group of Democratic lawmakers wrote to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in a letter that included a copy of the report. “Allowing DHS to continue to pick DoD’s pockets puts our military readiness at risk.”

The Pentagon’s press secretary said in a statement that because of its large annual budget the Department is able to carry out a variety of operations.

“The Pentagon, which operates on an annual budget of nearly $1 Trillion is able to execute on many missions at the same time, including operations with DHS, improvements for DODEA, and facility constructions across the country and the world,” said Kingsley Wilson, the Pentagon press secretary.

“Many additional priorities have been funded thanks to the passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill,” she added, referring to President Donald Trump’s signature tax and policy bill approved by Congress over the summer. “Spending allocated money on one mission does not mean other missions become depleted.”

The report was released by Warren and Rep. James Garamendi, D-Calif., who criticized the Trump administration for what they said was an unnecessary diversion of funds at the expense of military readiness.

In a statement Warren criticized Hegseth and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem for “using the defense budget as a slush fund for political stunts.”

“It’s an insult to our service members that Pete Hegseth and Kristi Noem are using the defense budget as a slush fund for political stunts,” Warren said in a statement. “Stripping military resources to promote a wasteful political agenda doesn’t make our military stronger or Americans safer.”

In a separate statement, Garamendi said: “Diverting over $2 billion in funds siphons money away from training, modernization, and maintenance: core investments that should support military families and prepare our forces to fight and win.”

On Thursday, the Senate Armed Services Committee will hold a hearing with top Pentagon officials including Gen. Gregory Guillot, the commander of U.S. Northern Command, to discuss the deployment of federalized National Guardsmen to several U.S. cities.

The hearing is expected to touch on the legality of the deployments and whether they were necessary.

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