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On December 5, 2024, a leading publication published the headline “Insurance CEO Gunned Down In Manhattan”. The report went on to state that Brian Thompson was “fatally wounded from behind in Midtown Manhattan by a killer who then walked coolly away”. The murder in broad daylight was indeed both cold and shocking. But numerous US citizens reacted differently: for those who faced insurance rejections or faced exorbitant healthcare costs, the news felt cathartic. Social media blew up. One post read: “All jokes aside … no one here is the judge of who deserves to live or die. That’s the job of the AI algorithm the insurance company created to maximize profits on your health.”

Five days later, Luigi Mangione, a handsome, twenty-six-year-old University of Pennsylvania alumnus with a graduate degree in computing, was arrested at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania. He faces court proceedings on federal and state charges of murder, with the district attorney seeking the capital punishment. So what is his background? And what drove the accused offense? These are the issues John H Richardson attempts to answer in an inquiry that explores broader themes, too.

Understanding the Person

A writer for a major publication, Richardson spent years researching the communities that lurk in the dark corners of the internet, producing articles about people “cursed with realistic fears about an apocalyptic future”. To uncover “the making” of his subject, Richardson first reviews Mangione’s wide-ranging book list. We learn that “[when] he was arrested, Luigi had a list of 295 books on Goodreads”. Their subject matter ranged from climate change to masculinity, along with a “focus on his own personal growth, both body and mind”. Furthermore, Richardson sifts through his communications with influencers and authors as well as his many updates on social media. These original materials, meant to paint a portrait of Mangione, instead render him an unclear character. Richardson tries to justify this by proposing that “Luigi’s mystery, in fact, is what gives him a little of that old deceiver’s charm”. Throughout the book, Richardson attempts to cast his subject in archetypal terms.

Mangione is profoundly worried about the world around him, one where ‘change is rapid whether we like it or not’

The Meaning Behind the Crime

As for “the meaning” of the title, Richardson uses as a clue three words – “delay”, “deny” and “remove”, etched on the bullets left behind at the crime scene. These are the terms sometimes used by medical insurers to reject claims. He looks at the evidence Mangione suffered from a chronic back condition, which could have been a reason for an attack, but finds no proof; instead, what meaning there is seems to rest in Mangione’s philosophical dread about the world around him, one where “everything is accelerating whether we like it or not, sliding faster and faster to the edge”; a world where the consensus seems to be that AI is going to eventually either take control, or destroy us, or both.

Missing Pieces

Notably missing from the book are conversations with the principal actors. Richardson asked, of course, but never expected access to Mangione himself. And his relatives stated explicitly that they had chosen not to talk to the media in prior to the trial. Another glaring gap is any significant information about the deceased, Thompson, though we learn that under his leadership, from the early 2020s, company earnings increased by 33%.

Unclear Conclusions

By the conclusion, the reader has little insight of Mangione’s personality or what could have driven his alleged crimes. Worse still, Richardson’s obvious sympathy for him creates the uncomfortable impression of having been exposed to a subtle approval of an targeted killing. In the book’s final lines, Richardson presents his mythical interpretation: “We’ve entered a era of stories, the insane ruler, the beast in the labyrinth and the emperor without clothes.” In that fable “outlaw heroes come with a appealing vow … They arrive in periods of unrest, when the population is in pain and nothing makes sense anymore.”

One thing is clear: as Mangione’s defence team continues in its attempts have charges that could lead to the death penalty dismissed, any reference of myths, folk heroes, heroes or monsters will not be allowed in court in defence of this attractive individual with a “features reminiscent of classical art” soon to be on trial for murder.