UnitedHealthcare CEO killing: Hotel clerk says 'cagey' suspect sought room

ALTOONA, Pa. -- Before he was arrested, Luigi Mangione walked into the Horseshoe Curve Lodge in Altoona, Pennsylvania, on Monday looking for a room, according to the desk clerk who greeted him and noticed what he described as the man's shifty behavior.

"He basically just walked in kind of cagey, just looking around, making sure he wasn't being watched, asked if he could get a room here," the hotel clerk, John Kuklis, told ABC News.

But that wasn't the reason Kuklis had to turn the man away. They didn't have a clean room available at that early hour, he said.

"I told him that he wouldn't be able to get one right now, that our housekeeper hadn't cleaned the rooms yet, that he had to come back at one o'clock. He asked if he could wait here. I told him no, because at the time, I didn't know that I could just allow him to wait for, you know, half the day. And he said, 'OK.' And he turned around and just left. Didn't say nothing. Never took his mask down," Kuklis said.

Mangione's arrival on Monday, the morning he was later arrested, came days after last week's fatal shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in Manhattan. Mangione faces a second-degree murder charge in connection with that killing. His defense attorney, Thomas Dickey, said he anticipates that Mangione will plead not guilty.

The Horseshoe Curve Lodge is roughly a 17-minute walk from the McDonald's where authorities would later confront Mangione, and take him into custody. Rooms at that hotel cost around $60 a night, according to a review of online price quotes.

At first, Kuklis thought the young man might be a veteran just returned to civilian life -- there are "a lot of vets that stay here," Kuklis said, and thought that might perhaps be why the young man was acting somewhat circumspect.

He added, "When [vets] come back, they have -- anybody that walks up behind 'em, or you feel a little shadow, or you hear a specific noise, you just kind of look over your shoulders, watch yourself, and he just, he was like, wouldn't turn his head, but his eyes were constantly looking like, is there somebody coming behind me, watching his surroundings?"

Had Mangione been able to get a room, Kuklis said, he would have been asked to show ID -- but that didn't happen. Mangione has been charged with falsely identifying himself to police, according to a complaint filed in Blair County, Pennsylvania.

Tuesday, officers called the hotel, asking if the suspect had stayed there, the clerk said.

"They called this morning and asked if he had stayed here, I says, no," Kuklis said, but mentioned to police the young man's earlier attempt to book a stay. "The officer goes, 'did he have a mask on? Did he ever take a mask off?'" Kuklis said, realizing in real time to the officer, "No, he never did take the mask off.'"

"Next thing I know there's three Logan Township police cars pulling in the parking lot. I'm like, holy crap" Kuklis said. "We pulled up our surveillance stuff, they go, 'Yeah, that's him.'"

Looking back, Kuklis said he "didn't even realize" that furtive young man might have been carrying the very weapon allegedly used to gun down the CEO. "I mean, theoretically, I guess he could have just pulled it out and shot me."