Moments after Luigi Mangione was handcuffed at a Pennsylvania McDonald’s, a police officer searching his backpack found a loaded gun magazine wrapped in a pair of underwear.
The discovery, recounted in court Monday as Mangione fights to keep evidence out of his New York murder case, convinced police in Altoona, Pennsylvania, that he was the man wanted in the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in Manhattan five days earlier.


What are you talking about, that’s absolutely how you describe a magazine. You load rounds into a magazine, ergo a magazine with rounds in it has been loaded. I suppose the more common thing to say is “pass me a fresh mag” but something like, for example: “woah hey that’s loaded” when referring to a magazine someone is carelessly handling would be completely normal thing to say.
Also, filled magazines absolutely are hazardous, and in the same exact ways as a loaded firearm - mishandling could lead to premature detonation of a round. Neither a gun nor a magazine is going to cause harm just by sitting undisturbed, but the part of the gun that’s filled with explosives is absolutely the most dangerous individual component of a firearm and should be treated with the same degree of respect as a loaded weapon.