On December 4, 2024, Brian Thompson, the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, was shot dead in broad daylight outside the New York Hilton Midtown in Manhattan, New York. The hooded and masked gunman fired three shots before fleeing the scene, using a city bike to reach Central Park, and disappearing from there. 

 

A nationwide manhunt unfolded, with the New York Police Department employing scuba divers and canine units, and police officers around the country on the lookout for the suspect. However, amidst all this, New Yorkers were largely indifferent. The FBI offered a $50,000 reward, and the NYPD put up an additional $10,000, but the lack of cooperation reflected the larger sense of detachment from the justice system. Many took to social media to share their apathy, making sarcastic comments and jokes about the incident. One tweet read, “It’s a shame my healthcare doesn’t cover vision, because I didn’t see s**t.” People were also purchasing the jacket and backpack that the suspect was seen wearing in the photos the NYPD had released to the point where they were sold out. There was even a lookalike contest held at Washington Square Park with eight participants, the winner coming by $50 for his killer looks. 

 

Soon enough, the authorities found the suspect’s backpack in Central Park. In it was a Tommy Hilfiger jacket, and a couple other items. But the only thing of interest? A stack of monopoly money. 

 

In late 2023, the Department of Justice had launched an investigation into whether UnitedHealth Group, one of the biggest healthcare insurance companies in America, was unfairly restricting competitors and running a monopoly. Along with attorney generals from the U.S. states of Maryland, Illinois, New York, and New Jersey, the DOJ filed a civil antitrust lawsuit to block the incorporation's acquisition of rival home health and hospice services provider Amedisys Inc. The complaint alleges that the transaction would eliminate the competition between UnitedHealth and Amedisys. According to the Department of Justice, doing so would “harm patients who receive home health and hospice services, insurers who contract for home health services, and nurses who provide home health and hospice services.” 

 

Of course, being the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, Brian Thompson was being investigated as part of the aforementioned probe. Interestingly, he was named in another lawsuit alleging that he knew the DOJ was going to investigate UnitedHealth Group, and before the information was made public, sold over $15 million of his personal UnitedHealth Group shares. Supposedly, had he not done so, he would have incurred a loss of $800k in shareholder value. Despite being a chief executive at a company being investigated for monopolization, as well as being accused of insider trading, which is considered a felony, mainstream media outlets still held Thompson in high regard. But as we’ve established, the general public thinks otherwise. So, the question is, what kind of atrocities must one commit for their death to be met with such mockery and celebration?

 

Thompson joined UnitedHealth Group in 2004 and was named the CEO of its insurance branch in 2021. Under his leadership, UnitedHealthcare acquired over one million customers in 2023, and the total revenue grew by 14.6%.  He is also one of the many executives in the insurance industry who have made a business off of denying patients claims and payments for what they deem “non-critical” visits to the ER, even allowing retroactive denial of coverage, meaning that the company can reverse a claim they’ve already paid for. It got to the point where the chief executive of the American Health Association had to address an open letter to Brian Thompson, imploring him to rethink their policies: 

 

“America’s hospitals and health systems are deeply concerned by UnitedHealthcare’s (UHC) recent policy announcements to allow for the retroactive denial of coverage for emergency level care in facilities. This policy would put patients’ health and wellbeing in jeopardy, and we urge you to reverse the policy immediately. Patients are not medical experts and should not be expected to self-diagnose during what they believe is a medical emergency. Threatening patients with a financial penalty for making the wrong decision could have a chilling effect on seeking medical care.”

 

Although one could argue that “this is just how insurance companies are”, as many have done online, UnitedHealthcare’s practices stand out. The company reportedly denies a whopping 33% of insurance claims, significantly higher than the industry average of 16%. This is why many are not too devastated by the death of Brian Thompson–in the eyes of the public, he, too, is a killer, one who took the lives of thousands by denying their insurance claims, leaving them in a position where they would either die or be left in crippling medical debt.

 

While public outrage was directed at the system, attention soon shifted to the suspect behind the shooting. On December 9th, authorities received a call from a McDonald’s employee in the small town of Altoona, Pennsylvania, leading them to Luigi Mangione. 

 

Mangione, a 26-year-old man, was found with a 3D-printed gun and silencer, a loaded Glock magazine with six 9mm rounds, multiple fake IDs, a U.S. passport, and $10,000 in cash. The police reported that there were clothes and face masks similar to what the suspect had been seen wearing, as well as a water bottle and KIND bar wrapper with fingerprints that allegedly matched those near the crime scene. They also stated that they found a spiral notebook with to-do lists, entries, etc. along with a 3-page manifesto. Major media outlets refused to publish this manifesto in full, choosing to only selectively quote it, but independent journalist Ken Klippestein managed to obtain a copy and published it.

 

It is worth noting that Mangione had not been in touch with his family for the past few months before the shooting, and no one knew of his whereabouts. His mother had filed a missing person’s report on November 18, 2024, but nothing had been done about it until Mangione was suspected of the killing of a millionaire.

 

With his arrest, questions quickly arose about who Luigi Mangione was and what could have driven him to commit such a crime. Netizens found his Twitter account, his Instagram account, his Goodreads account, and even his LinkedIn, which revealed that he graduated in 2020 with a Bachelor’s Degree from the private Ivy League University of Pennsylvania.  He eventually went on to get a Master’s Degree in Computer Science and a Minor in Mathematics. He was even valedictorian of his graduating class at the elite, private, all-boys Gilman School in Baltimore, Maryland. Mangione clearly comes from an affluent background, so much so that many have started speculating on whether the Mangione family could be richer than Brian Thompson himself. In his grandmother’s will of $30 million-$100 million, it is stated that anyone from the large Mangione family who is charged and convicted of a felony automatically forfeits their inheritance. Why then would a wealthy, young man with a promising future risk it all to kill the CEO of an insurance company?

 

The three shell casings left at the crime scene had three words etched into them. One bullet says “delay,” another one says “deny,” and the last one, curiously,  says “depose,” meaning to remove someone from office or power or, in other words, to dethrone them. This seems to be a reference to “Delay, Deny, Defend: Why Insurance Companies Don’t Pay Claims and What You Can Do About It” by Jay M. Feinman, a book that is described as “an expose of insurance injustice and a plan for consumers and lawmakers to fight it.”

 

Mangione’s Twitter header had a picture of him, a Pokémon, as well as a spine x-ray. Some people have tied this to an anonymous Reddit account, one they believe belongs to Mangione. This account took part extensively in discussions about spondylolisthesis. Spondylolisthesis, colloquially known as “spondy,” occurs when one spinal vertebra slips out of place compared to another. Many believed that being denied insurance for surgery for spondy is what radicalised Mangione. That theory has since been debunked, since it’s been revealed that he was never under a UnitedHealthcare insurance plan. However, another theory has been circulating amidst netizens. An overwhelming amount of people seem to believe that Luigi Mangione is just a fall guy. Amongst other things, spondy can cause chronic back pain, excruciating enough for people to struggle to do even day to day activities. This would not line up with the culprit’s escape on a city bike. In addition to that, people find it hard to believe that a guy who successfully escaped New York without the police on his trail was found a few states over with most of the evidence they would need to convict him. Some people have resorted to an Elle Woods-esque defense, pointing out that the eyebrows of the culprit in the photos look drastically different than Mangione’s after the arrest; they could not have grown that much in the span of a couple of days.

 

However, regardless of how people feel about Mangione’s innocence, this incident has brought the people of America together. Netizens believe that people have started gaining class consciousness, but I think that is far from it— they have just begun to realise their collective grievances against the rich. Class consciousness can be defined as “awareness among members of a social class, particularly the working class, of their shared class interests and opposition to other classes, leading to efforts to transform social structures towards a classless society.” Even fans of Ben Shapiro, an alt-right commentator and influencer, have spoken up in his comment section after realising that the only reason he would defend Brian Thompson is because he is far closer to him in terms of wealth as compared to his fans. In light of this, people have been quoting the saying, “It’s not left vs right, but up vs down,” where up and down refer to the bourgeoisie and the working class, which ironically is a leftist belief.

 

As of now, Luigi Mangione has pled not guilty to the 11 charges he faces in the state of New York, including first-degree murder in furtherance of terrorism, second-degree murder in furtherance of terrorism and multiple firearm offences. He is currently being held in the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, New York, with his next court date being in February. Whether or not the court of law finds him guilty remains to be seen, but one thing is clear: the people want him to be free.