Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - ZONE 7: Procedural Chaos: Inside the Mangione Hearing That’s Putting Police Training on Trial

Episode Date: December 7, 2025

In this week’s Crime Roundup, Sheryl McCollum and Joshua Schiffer Break down the federal hearing surrounding Luigi Mangione, the suspect accused of assassinating UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in December of 2024.  What began as a five-day manhunt has become a master class in what not to do, with missed warrants, coached testimony, and evidence on the verge of being thrown out. Sheryl and Joshua examine how procedural missteps could weaken a potential death penalty case and why “get a warrant” isn't just good advice; it's the foundation of justice. They then turned their attention to Massachusetts, where the trial of Brian Walshe, who is accused of killing and dismembering his wife, reveals how arrogance, lies, and a trail of Google searches can expose a killer's truth. Highlights: • (0:00) Welcome to Crime Roundup with Sheryl McCollum and Joshua Schiffer • (0:15) "99 percent of the time, you need a warrant... it won’t hurt your case if you get one and don’t need it.” • (4:00) Coached testimony and the danger of tailoring officer statements for admissibility • (7:30) What happens when training, procedure, and pressure collide in the courtroom • (9:00) How early media leaks and “pre-trial publicity” can poison a case before it begins • (10:30) The potential collapse of key evidence and its impact on death penalty eligibility • (12:15) The rules of criminal procedure and what it means when they don’t apply equally • (17:15) The defense’s dream scenario: getting the weapon suppressed because of a“bad stop” • (17:45) The Brian Walshe trail and the anatomy of a cover-up • (19:30) Walshe’s “woke up and she was dead” defense and why it’s collapsing in court • (21:45) The digital trail: how Google searches reveal motive, method, and mindset • (23:00) Closing thoughts: why “get a warrant” isn’t optional, it’s the rule of lawAbout the Hosts Joshua Schiffer is a veteran trial attorney and one of the Southeast’s most respected legal voices. He is a founding partner at ChancoSchiffer P.C., where he has litigated high-stakes criminal, civil rights, and personal injury cases for over two decades. Known for his bold courtroom presence and ability to clearly explain complex legal issues, Schiffer is a frequent media contributor and a fearless advocate for accountability. Sheryl “Mac” McCollum is an active crime scene investigator for a Metro Atlanta Police Department and the director of the Cold Case Investigative Research Institute, which partners with colleges and universities nationwide. With more than 4 decades of experience, she has worked on thousands of cold cases using her investigative system, The Last 24/361, which integrates evidence, media, and advanced forensic testing. Her work on high-profile cases, including The Boston Strangler, Natalie Holloway, Tupac Shakur and the Moore’s Ford Bridge lynching, earned her an Emmy Award for CSI: Atlanta and induction into the National Law Enforcement Hall of Fame in 2023. Preorder Sheryl’s upcoming book, Swans Don’t Swim in a Sewer: Lessons in Life,Justice, and Joy from a Forensic Scientist, releasing May 2026 from Simon and Schuster. https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Swans-Dont-Swim-in-a-Sewer/Sheryl-Mac-McCollum/9798895652824 Stay Connected Subscribe using your favorite podcast platform and leave a review to support the show. Have acase or topic you’d like Sheryl and Joshua to cover? Email [e-mail] the Hosts: • Sheryl on X: @ColdCaseTips • Facebook: @sheryl.mccollum • Joshua on X and Instagram: @lawyerschiffSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed human. Welcome to Crime Roundup. Joshua Schiffer, I got to tell you, I am so irritated. I'm telling you. I mean, I don't even have anything positive to start with. I try to be a glass half full, but I'm going to tell you something. And I want everybody.

that is wearing a badge to listen to me right this minute. 99.9% of the time, you need a warrant. 99.9% of the time you need a warrant if you are searching a person, their home, their business, or their vehicle. We've made it easy. We've made it easy. We spent the last 50 years figuring out, Okay, we warrants are now super required.

Let's make it real easy to get them, and we've done that. And let me make it even easier. I'm not an attorney. Listen to me, I am not an attorney, but I got one sitting here with me. It won't hurt your case if you get one and don't need it. No, no. So the question would be to me, get one every time, correct? there is no downside save exigent circumstances to getting a warrant warrants are there as the mandatory bright line safety rule check that is easy for judges to attach to and they say all right here's the stuff that happened when there was a warrant here's the stuff that happened when there wasn't a warrant it's pretty easy to separate the two buckets Cheryl you and I know half the damn judges in this town we could get a warrant within an

very short period literally it's set up to video appear and get a warrant gone are the days you had to go search for somebody at a bar or restaurant it's all video it's all electronic they used to hunt judges down in person just with the piece of paper man there was an officer who's job oh no i can go find judge smith let's go find him he'll sign this right now because warrants now are so easy there is no excuse. Joshua, Judge Andy Mickle, God rest his soul. We knew where to find him. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Wasn't hard. Fuller Barstools in to the left. Yeah. Old Judge Fuller out in Gwinnett County, who I knew very, very well similarly. And you could find, it's not hard to find a magistrate. There's a duty magistrate on 24 hours a day in every major county in the nation. Like, it's a magistrate. It's,

It's, and for those of y'all that are wondering what we're coveting about, it's this Mangione hearing that is happening right now, or it's probably just wrapped up for the day, and, and listening to very strong arguments about fundamental stuff, law enforcement is supposed to do, be aware of how they're supposed to act, especially when you've been dispatched on a, at the tail end of what is in a five-day. manhunt for an assassination caught on video. It has not been the strongest showing for law enforcement. Bottom line, this will be, if not the biggest case of their career, the biggest media case of their career. How in the world do five officers show up? Then supervisors are made aware of who they got, and there's not a warrant for that back.

backpack. And now that they find themselves in this position on such, on a case of such importance, not just because it's a big crime and a horrible murder, the politics that are connected to this run real deep and fundamental with some class issues. We, we haven't even gotten into the politics of what the defense and Mr. Mangione and all that, the social movement by, no, we haven't even gotten to that part. This is. fundamental operative stuff. And the real problem is now that we're in the middle of it, it appears that it would be fair to conclude the officer has been specifically coached how to thread this needle in a very delicate manner in order for the judge to allow the evidence

to stand. And that begs the question that underlies all these criminal prosecutions and everything in civil court? Are you lying? Is that really what happened? Are you just testifying because you know you need to say this in order to prevail? Because unfortunately, when you look at police citizen encounters, which have been litigated to death for 50 years, you got, there are tier levels. There are more opinions on what an officer was and was not allowed to do with or without what level of suspicion. We now train officers with big, bright highlighters. Hey, here's how probable cause works.

Here's where the lines are. You've got to stay within the lines because if you get outside the lines, everything happens outside that line is not coming into your case. And unfortunately, this officer appeared to have not taken this by his own admission as a terribly serious dispatch. and he has got to establish it's uh i believe debt whiler is the name he has got to establish very specifically that when he was dispatched he didn't have any specific probable cause of realization that this was the guy but this was man juni he has to have been at basically zero alert

because if he was it alert if he had suspicion he should have gotten a warrant he should he should have Mirandized people immediately. That's right. It's this trap for the poor officer where he can't testify. Yeah, no, I thought it was him. So I was just going to go poker. No, no, no, no, no. That's going to lose the case for you.

And that poor officer is going to get pilloried by the fact that it appears that his testimony has been thoroughly coached in a specific way. Y'all, you have listened to Joshua's. Schiffer on Zone 7, Crom Roundup, Court TV, a plethora of other places. Y'all don't always

know the words he's using. Let's be honest. He uses some phrases, some words where you're like, I need to look that up. What did he just say? Here's a hint. You don't want that person? Cross-examining

you. Trust me. Y'all heard him when he told y'all he went to camp to learn how to come at you and the reports from the actual examination include and there are some wonderful people this is of course federal court so we're really struggling with knowing exactly what's happening inside the room but there have been multiple reports of some admissions from the officers about their procedure that basically stopped all the criminal practitioners in the room and everybody knows that knows criminal law stopped and looked at each other and were like did he did he just say that okay let's keep going there

and that is not a good feeling when you're the witness that is not a good feeling when that's your when that's your witness and you're the lawyer because the witness is going to get down go how do I do man how do I do and you know oh man you did you did you do oh man you did great great when you very clearly illustrated your lack of knowledge as to this specific training issue and gutted everything we're trying to do here with your authentic testimony. And I'm afraid there were a couple of those conversations coming with some of this when and how you obtain a warrant because a warrant's just that easy. And I tell you, if the government loses the bag and the contents, we're going to

have a whole other discussion about the poisoning the jury well you and i talked about this last week and how these statements that are coming out from the administration and other agencies really push the ethical boundaries of what law enforcement is supposed to say or not say most importantly not say at the early stages of an investigation and it it brings in all that pretrial publicity stuff where even the most conservative justices that are on the most federal panels now look at that and go whoa whoa whoa whoa fundamental fairness issue you you have an elected or appointed prosecutor that owns the press dominating a narrative while this innocent citizen and judges really do think about the innocent citizen they do they reverse roles and go what if it was me and

that position, what would I be able to? And they see that fundamental unfairness of a narrative being created by law enforcement before there's any investigation. That makes it very hard to have integrity in your judicial system. And now if you're going to get some of that key evidence, i.e. the manifesto or not a manifesto, the gun, not a gun, the statements, not the statements about the fake ID that's not a fake. Well, yeah, it's the only fake idea I had, man. you lose that stuff, and I'm not saying the case falls apart, but it sure isn't as strong as it should be. That's right.

I don't believe the case is going to fall apart. One, because we got a video. However, it would be great to say, hey, didn't he check into that hostel with a fake ID from New Jersey? Is this the same ID? Great. And what caliber 9mm was used? Is it the same ammunition that was in that bag?

And this manifesto, does he not say, I want to get a health care CEO or whatever he says? You want that to come in. Yeah. It is important evidence. And yet the fundamentals of the case are going to stay the same. And I'm certain that a good prosecutor can put together a case even if the evidence is suppressed. But it is not the case that the public deserves. and if there's any chance at the most aggressive remedies being applied, which a lot of people are calling for as one of the few legitimate deterrent death penalty cases that's out there, because deterrence in the death penalty, everybody says that death penalty is not a deterrent.

Well, when you've got a random victim like this who's being selected purely because of their political or economic position, well, now you've actually got some deterrence because it tells the way. would-be assassins. Nope, nope, nope. We'll make these political cases death penalty. If the death penalty portion of this case gets substantially weaker, that causes big problems. And I tell you, every suppressed piece of evidence is going to be multiple appeals if this is a death penalty case. But you shouldn't give them, just give them anything. Oh, yeah.

I mean, this would be a huge blow. shouldn't happen should not even be up for discussion shouldn't be something we're in court arguing about it should have been done by the book by the numbers they should have called in a district attorney to say hey how do we proceed

what do we do this is the guy and what's frustrating from the practitioner perspective is due to this being so factually driven and rules and procedure driven no matter what your political and personal moral persuasions are in the criminal justice system you probably have an attachment to the rules and you can be pro state you can be pro defense this is a are do you believe in rules or not because there

aren't more clear rules than some of these and if these These rule, if the rules don't apply here, when do they really apply? I mean, a man's life is on the line. One of the big criticisms of our system is every error is harmless. And it's, oh, the rules, man, they're all there, but they're not real rules because hold on. You can violate them and still achieve a conviction that withstands appellate review. And so now you just don't need the state break in one or two rule. No, you need some pretty good stuff.

Clear violations of a clear law, rule, ruling to win on appeal. This would appear to be kind of clear and sets back the whole discourse. To me, if you have an officer testifying and he says, look, I mean, I get this call to go to a McDonald's. No way it's this guy. He planned this thing so well that you would think, okay, he's been in a hostel. Nobody's going to really see him. Fake ID. He moved about the city without leaving much of a trail.

Or so he thought the way he took the bus, the way he took, you know, other transportation to try to hide. Yeah. I understand. And I would completely. when I would be listening to him, I would get that. No way, this is going to be the guy, but I'm going to stroll into the McDonald's and I'm going to make them happy.

I'm going to do my job. I'm going to check him out. Well, he knew as soon as he saw him, that's the guy we've all been seeing. At that moment, there should have been a supervisor notified. There should have been, you know, an ADA en route. I mean, this thing should have been let's circle the wagons and let's get to the smartest person to tell us the best course of action

and and really even if you're an inexperienced or undertrained officer which this officer unfortunately isn't he knew had well enough training to know what to do or not do let the training kick in all right at the moment you realize it's him It's detention, Miranda, and then call for guidance and backup. As soon as you have exigently secured the scene, because as soon as you realize, oh, look, that's a killer, you get to be afraid. Officer has the right and the privilege to be fearful for public and personal safety. The moment he realizes the person that he's interacting with is the subject. of a manhunt and want it. But he'd kind of been told that before even showing up. He just needed to

make sure he disclaims that enough. And in fact, there was very specific testimony today about how the supervising officer had said, hey, if it's really him, I'll buy you a hoagie, trying to show how much of this wasn't serious. And the state needs this to not be serious until, uh, office. officer actually identifies him. But then the moment you've identified him, everything's got to go according to the book because this is going to be picked apart and scrutinized to the highest level. So you put him in custody, secure the safety of yourself, the defendant, anybody else around, and then you call for backup. And you get the right direction, including before you search anything, get a warrant. Before you say anything to him, you mirandize him. And to miss some easy

swings built a pile of nuggets that the defense is reveling in. Imagine being the defense lawyer and getting the potential murder weapon suppressed because of a bad stop. And that's really how you're going to hear this referred to is this was a bad stop get a warrant get a warrant get a warrant get a warrant not everybody is as sophisticated as mr mangioni though we we have some other trial action going on this week i i don't know if you've been paying too much attention to that big case out of massachusetts this brian walsh case which you can tell it's a slow trial season because this is the case that so many people are on right now talk about a case that didn't need to get tried i 100% believe this was a zero offer case that it was man you can

plead to the court you can take the deal but we ain't going to give you one minute off of a max recommendation because of just the horrificness of the allegations, followed up by the overwhelming evidence that Brian Walsh, who killed his wife, dismembered her, hid her body, and then lied to everyone, including their three kids about what happened to mommy. I almost feel bad for the defense crew, except for the fact that I really kind of am picking a bone with them. The defense opening, and these guys don't have squat to work with. The big mistake that lawyers make is that if you don't have anything to work with, you just get loud and angry and people will pay attention to you. But that's basically telling

everybody, hey, we don't have anything and we need to lose. And the defense for Mr. Walsh is laughable and is basically guaranteeing he has to show up and testify and he's going to get eviscerated on cross, but that he woke up in the middle of the night or was there in the middle of the night and she was supposed to be asleep when he gets into bed and she's not asleep, she's dead. And instead of, you know, calling the ambulances and law enforcement and, you know, family members and freaking out, no, he started searching the internet for the worst, how do you dispose of a body admissions of all time? Then he disposed of the body in what I'm pretty certain is a graphically, inexcusably awful manner. involving multiple dumpsters, and then he's lied his way into this position where I expect after a disastrous attempt for him to save himself via testifying, he's going to get convicted and sentenced

to multiple consecutives. Well, I try to say as often as I can, a lie is as good as a confession. but once I lock you in and you start changing it even slightly now we're getting somewhere but you know it's always a clue to me Josh when your place of business reports you missing before your spouse bingo

it was like okay man there there's just no logic and no matter what story you start to tell because you failed to pass the first step. Like, you don't, you don't just keep quiet about them things. Wake up next to a dead woman, crawl into bed and the person's dead, and quiet, that is not what's happening. No one understands or agrees with, no, no, no, you don't tell anybody about that.

Yeah, don't tell them. And you don't want to upset the kids, so chop her up and get rid of her. Certainly not the three children you have. Oh, and the fact that you discovered that, yes, she was having an affair and that's awful and terrible it's it's not death penalty though like having an affair shouldn't result in you being murdered um general rules um but yeah this case and it again and and a lot of the discussion is about the narcissism and almost psychopathy of putting up a defense like this because it's so ridiculous his google searches all right ladies and gentlemen

if you did it on the internet we can pay somebody to go find out what you did i know you think you can encrypt a lot of it and there's arguments over the interpretate but really digital bits and bites leave trails and google is only too happy to comply with subpoenas and man his search history could not be more inculpatory it's literally uh can you identify a body when you break the teeth in what's what's the best saw to cut up a body is a hack saw really the best saw to cut up a butt like it is Cheryl I'm telling you it makes you want to just wish him into prison so that we don't have to be exposed to the choice it's it's insane but gripping television in a lot of ways people really like watching the case because of its salaciousness absolutely well honey I hate to cut this short

But I've got a family dinner to get to. It's going to be a tough, tough night. But I do appreciate you always. And I, you know, I just, I get so frustrated because it's like, we've done it. We've told you. We've trained you. And look where we are. We're in a position we shouldn't be in.

And the poor captain, the poor lieutenant, like, man, they covered this. Like, you go back to the barracks. Man, we, you, you, you covered this, right? Like, you, this is the fun, oh my, it has got to be crushing. So to me, the training should be you get a warrant. Every time, get a warrant. It's that easy, y'all. It ain't hard, you hear, oh, it's hard to get a, no, no, no, really.

You raise your hand, you say that you're a sworn police officer with lots of training, and then you say, well, my belief is I observed, since I observed this evidence, I believe a crime has been committed. I would like to show the permission of the court to put this person under arrest and go search them. Most of the time, the judge is going to ask you a couple questions such as it really is you, and you really did see them and this happened, or this is what you saw and heard and reported from people. Yep. It's a specific articulable suspicion.

It is not beyond a reasonable doubt. It is not clear and convincing. It is not preponderance. No, it is the lowest bar. In law, you have to be able to enunciate and articulate a crime might have occurred. That's it. So there's just no excuse to skip. It's like making a grilled cheese sandwich, and you're like, well, we're going to do this,

but we don't need cheese. Like, it just kills me. It just, it just is so frustrating. I love talking with these conversations, the highlight of my week. I love y'all in the audience. Ms. Cheryl, I know that you're going to go celebrate some wonderful stuff with some loved people.

So I'm going to say goodnight to everyone. Go love somebody, even if it's yourself. And I'm sorry if you heard one of the Justice Kitty's purring the entire time. She's just relentless these days. All right, have a good week, honey. I'll talk to you soon. Bye, y'all.

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