Live updates: Luigi Mangione faces new federal charges over UnitedHealthcare CEO murder

Max Matza
US reporter

Image source, Reuters

The level of protection being provided to Luigi Mangione is equivalent to what visiting diplomats and dignitaries would
typically receive when they visit New York, Felipe Rodriguez, a
former detective sergeant who served on the NYPD for 21 years, tells the BBC.

Rodriguez, who now teaches at the John Jay College of
Criminal Justice in New York City, says Mangione is receiving “extreme protective executive protection” – or what
officers there simply call “protecting the package”.

The suspect is being protected by at least one heavily-armoured
counter assault team, who are prepared to enter a conflict if the extradition team is
attacked. Rodriguez estimates that there are more than 100 agents and officers involved
in today’s operation.

Based on the pictures he’s seen so far, Rodriguez
says there are more officers in place for the Mangione extradition than there
were for the transport of Mexican drug lord El Chapo in 2017. He says there are
about as many officers on the move as there were for Donald Trump’s court hearings
in Manhattan.

The El Chapo extradition in 2017 was “not at such
a grandiose scale, so visible”.

“That was to send a message basically,” he says about today’s transport of Mangione. “That
wasn’t just the fact of keeping him safe.”

The heightened security, he says, is because Mangione has “so many people that
are sympathetic to his viewpoint”.

“We have to be so careful. You never know what
could happen.”