I have a secret that I want to share with you.
Okay, it's not really a secret, but I think more of you guys should know.
I want to let you guys know that you can catch this podcast, not only here on YouTube, but also on Spotify.
And while the show will be the same in both places, there are a few things that I love about Spotify.
First of all, was the recent Spotify wrapped.
You guys have been sending me DMs and screenshots of Rotten Mango and Motz being at the top of your podcast charts.
And I just feel really connected with you guys.
Secondly, Spotify is really the best platform to listen to our shows, both audio and video.
Another one of my favorite things is being able to seamlessly switch between watching the video or just listening to the audio.
So you can enjoy the show on the couch or on the go without missing a single beat.
Also on the creator side, Spotify has been able to give me a lot of insights into what you guys like and what you guys don't like.
So it's been helping me figure out what resonates the most with you.
And that's helped me shape this podcast into something that I hope you love.
And I can't wait to hear what you think about the Spotify experience.
Let me know in the comments if you've checked it out.
And I can't wait to see your Spotify wrap for 2025.
You've got to start now.
My dog Mango has been with me through some really crazy times in life.
I mean, she's been with us for the past 10 years.
If you guys don't know, Mango is my little friendship bulldog with half hair.
Okay. She's fuzzy only half the time.
And she is literally the glue of my family.
I have quite literally named an entire podcast and a YouTube channel from my dog, Mango.
She is the reason that these channels exist.
But three years ago, Mango was diagnosed with this autoimmune disease and she was always at risk of excessive bleeding.
Her fur was falling out in clumps.
It was, it was a pretty stressful time in my life.
I was constantly emotional about Mango being in pain.
And then I would get so stressed out every time I started going over the vet bills.
Every time we took her to the vet, it was like thousands of dollars because her condition was so difficult to treat.
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The man is wearing an olive green jacket with big pockets in the front.
Most of his face is covered with a mask and he's carrying this big old backpack.
Because today is the day.
He's walking through New York City, glancing from side to side, making sure that nobody is staring at him strangely.
Because the last thing that he needs right now, in this moment, is to be stopped, questioned, or even have any sort of long -standing interaction with any New Yorker.
Probably the worst -case scenario would be an interaction with the NYPD.
But he's not even trying to think about that.
Because is that woman over there staring at him right now?
It's fine. It's fine.
The man is on a mission.
He needs to get to the destination and everything else can be figured out once he gets there.
He walks straight into the park in broad daylight.
There's a group of girls in matching outfits wearing these plaid skirts, dancing to the K -Pop group twice's song.
Heart Shaker. Really good song, by the way.
They're filming a K -Pop cover.
A man walking through the park stares at him.
He says, bro, I don't know if you should be doing this, but your life choice, I guess.
What is that supposed to mean?
Another citizen stops and points, he's the one!
He's the one! And with that, the man in the green jacket, he starts smiling.
Because that means he just won $50.
He is contestant number six in the lookalike contest for the shooter that killed Bryan Thompson, the CEO of UnitedHealthcare.
The man in the hood, the winner, he says, you know what's so funny?
I got no looks. While I was coming from home to the park, no looks until I got over here, and now everybody wants a picture with me.
What does that mean?
No looks. Nobody looked at him strangely, even though he matches the exact profile of a killer that's quote unquote on the run.
How is it that a man is shot and killed in the middle of Manhattan in broad daylight, he hasn't even been laid to rest yet.
The shooter has yet to be caught.
Technically, a killer is on the loose, and yet there is a lookalike contest for the killer?
I mean, what could you have done so horribly in life that in death, people are holding lookalike contests for the killer while the killer is still on the loose?
There is a literal CCTV video of somebody shooting and killing the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, but most Americans are questioning, who really is the real victim here?
Is it the one that was shot and killed?
Or is it the shooter himself?
We would like to thank today's sponsors who have made it possible for Rotten Mango to support the Pan Foundation, which works to remove barriers to medical treatment.
They also champion policies that expand access to care.
This episode's partnerships have also made it possible to support Rotten Mango's growing team.
And we'd also like to thank you guys for your continued support as we work on our mission to be worthy advocates.
As always, full show notes are available at RottenMangoPodcast .com.
A few big disclaimers for today's case.
This case is currently ongoing.
There's new developments every single day.
If there are any major developments, which is to be expected, we're going to add them in the pinned comments below or perhaps even make a follow -up video.
But most of what we could find is available publicly online, which includes netizen comments, theories, netizens' own personal experiences with healthcare in the US.
And legally speaking, I am not here nor would I ever be able to verify if each and every netizen's personal anecdote is factually correct.
We trust you guys to come to your own judgements and opinions like you do with any and all cases that we bring you.
And we tried to gather all the sentiments on the internet as well as legacy media included so you can see the full picture of what's going on.
This is not supposed to be a think piece.
We're not trying to sway you one way or the other.
And obviously I think you guys are smart enough to make your own informed decisions on how you feel about something.
However, it would be silly to not recognize the healthcare system to everyday Americans is personally, in my opinion, a torture system.
And I think to not even address that would be kind of goofy.
Additionally, just because somebody has been arrested does not mean that they are guilty of a crime.
Everybody has the right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty.
And one last disclaimer.
For the sake of brevity, we will be referring to UnitedHealthcare as united.
But please note that there is no relation to United Airlines, which is more commonly referred to as united.
Additionally, UnitedHealthcare is just one arm of a massive company called UnitedHealth Group.
So when we refer to Bryan Thompson as the CEO of UnitedHealthcare or United, he's actually the CEO of just UnitedHealthcare.
There are other CEOs involved.
There's a ton of different subsidiaries that UnitedHealth Group owns.
And then there's a CEO that is the CEO of UnitedHealth Group, the whole organizational structure.
So I know that some people on Twitter were getting a little bit confused because they're like, wait, I saw different names as the CEO of UnitedHealth Group.
But this is UnitedHealthcare's CEO.
So this is the insurance arm.
This is where people feel, I guess, more emotional about the case.
But we will get into the nitty gritty of the UnitedHealth Group in a second.
So with that being said, let's get into it.
Goodreads is kind of like the yelp for books.
You go on there and you rate and review books that you've read, but it's also a great place to stalk someone.
And I don't condone this, but you would be surprised at how much someone could gather from the types of books you read.
For example, someone can see how often you read, how well read you are, what kind of genre of books you read, but those are very obvious.
You can even tell if someone is more lenient and likely to give high ratings.
Maybe they're generous versus someone who never gives a high rating and just has a plethora of two -star reviews.
If the Goodreads account holder leaves reviews, you can even see how they feel about certain topics, what kind of things that they pick out from a 3 -6 -900 page book.
Some people will even take it a step further, trying to figure out someone's most favorited books, their highest rated books, and see what that says about you.
Some popular book analysis on TikTok include, which are all jokes, don't get offended.
If your fantasy book choice is Cruel Prince, you're a furry.
I said it. If your favorite book is The Secret History by Donna Tartt, one TikToker states, you think reading classics and drinking red wine and smoking cigarettes makes you all mysterious and so, so intelligent, but it just kind of makes you annoying.
If your favorite is A Little Life, you are mentally ill.
It's a really sad book.
You're torturing yourself if you read it.
Apparently it's devastating.
Now the past few days, a Goodreads account has gone viral, which doesn't really happen.
I mean, usually you have people's social media accounts going viral, but this is like someone's Yelp page going viral.
But everyone on the internet is trying to decipher, crack the code to what does this mean?
What does this man's Goodreads account mean?
The viral account shows the man has 295 books read, logged on Goodreads, and is currently reading The Book Thief, a historical fiction about Nazi Germany during World War II.
Omnivore's Diet by Michael Pollan, which is about the ethical implications of our food choices and How to Change Your Brain by Michael Pollan, which is a very intense book about how psychedelics could be used to treat mental health conditions.
It's a very interesting combination of reads.
In his favorite section you have The Lorax by Dr.
Seuss, which is not just a children's book, but it's a critique of environmental practices as well as a critique of the timber industry and it's actually a pretty anti -capitalist critique.
Other favorites include The Bullet Journal by Ryder Carroll and What's Our Problem by Tim Urban.
Aside from his favorite, it's clear that this man is interested in Hawaii.
He's reviewed two travel guide books for Hawaii.
There's self -help books thrown into the mix, as well as fitness books.
A mixture of tech -related reads are on there, such as Algorithm Design, which he rated 4 .16 stars.
The 4 -Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss is there.
And this one is interesting because he actually leaves a little personal snippet in the review.
He writes, I'm reminded of a long -standing debate at my childhood dinner table.
Whenever we would eat steak, I would use my knife in my left hand and my fork in my right hand, which would infuriate my mother.
She would remind me to cut with my right hand since I was right -handed and switch back and forth my right hand for each bite.
When pressed for a reason why, she would reply, because that's how it's done.
That's how you cut it.
Dissatisfied, I would press further.
She would reply, because that's proper manners.
As a six -year -old, I found this to be the most pointless and inefficient process in the world.
And I would voice this opinion.
Why would I switch hands every single bite to maintain some arbitrary convention?
The final reply was, one day you're going to meet a nice girl and when you go out to dinner with her, you're going to need proper manners.
My response then, and still a fundamental belief to this day, is that anyone who cares about something so small and insignificant is maybe not someone I would want to spend my time with.
This is comment under 4 -hour workweek by Tim Ferriss.
The Goodreads account also goes on to like two quotes, because you can like quotes from books.
One reads, Science fiction is already happening to some extent in our own society.
Instead of removing the conditions that make people depressed, modern society gives them antidepressant drugs.
In effect, antidepressants are a means of modifying an individual's internal state in such a way as to enable him to tolerate social conditions that he would otherwise find intolerable.
Imagine a society that subjects people to conditions that makes them terribly unhappy, then gives them the drugs to take away their unhappiness.
This quote is from the book, Industrial Society and Its Future.
For the full book, the Goodreads account leaves a lengthy review that becomes very pertinent.
It reads, Clearly written by a mathematics protégé, reads like a series of lemmas on the questions of 21st century quality of life.
It's easy to quickly and thoughtlessly write this off as a manifesto of a lunatic in order to avoid facing some of the uncomfortable problems it identifies, but it's simply impossible to ignore how prescient many of his predictions about modern society turned out.
He was a violent criminal, rightfully imprisoned, who maimed innocent people.
All these actions tend to be characterized as those of a crazy luddite, however, they are more accurately seen as those of an extreme political revolutionary.
A take I found interesting online is this.
So then he quotes a netizen comment he read online.
He had the balls to recognize that peaceful protest has gotten us absolutely nowhere.
And at the end of the day, he's probably right.
Oil barons haven't listened to any environmentalist, but they feared him.
When all other forms of communication fail, violence is necessary to survive.
You may not like his methods, but to see things from his perspective, it's not terrorism.
It's war and revolution.
Fossil fuel companies suppress anything that stands within their way.
And within a generation or two, it will begin costing human lives by greater and greater magnitudes until the earth is just a flaming ball orbiting third from the sun.
Peaceful protest is outright ignored.
Economic protest isn't possible in the current system.
So how long until we recognize that violence against those who lead us to such destruction is justified as self -defense?
Those companies don't care about you or your kids or your grandkids.
They have zero qualms about burning down the planet for a buck.
So why should we have any qualms about burning them down to survive?
We're animals just like everything else on this planet.
Except, we've forgotten the law of the jungle and bend over backwards for our overlords when any other animal would recognize the threat and fight to the death for their survival.
Violence never solved anything is a statement uttered by cowards and predators.
The Goodreads accounts rates this book four stars.
This book is written by the Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski.
He killed three people and injured 23 others.
He was academically successful, at least at one point in his life.
He attended Harvard as a mathematics prodigy and became, I believe, the youngest assistant professor in the history of UC Berkeley.
Eventually, he quit everything to live a primitive lifestyle in a cabin in the woods, which would've been fine, but he's very anti -tech, anti -industrialism, anti -capitalist, which again would be ideologies to be talked about.
But then he started making bombs and sending them out, which is the only way that the Unabomber believed he could draw attention to his manifesto and ideas.
So why is this Goodreads review going viral?
Because perhaps that's what the account holder was inspired by.
Trade in a violent crime for everyone else to know his message.
I mean, it's too soon to say for sure, but this is the Goodreads account of the arrested suspect for the killing of Brian Thompson, UnitedHealthcare CEO.
And I guess netizens are wondering, is this what he was trying to tell us?
If you wake up in the middle of a surgery, most likely you cannot speak.
You cannot tell the doctors, hey, so I can hear you drilling and sawing into my skull and my body.
You can't even twitch, you're practically paralyzed.
One person who woke up in the middle of surgery said it was terrible.
They said, my brain kept telling me over and over, say your name, say your name, say something, do something, wiggle your toes.
But I was completely incapable of saying something or moving my body at all.
Waking up in the midst of a surgery can actually be so traumatic, depending on the surgery, that sometimes doctors will even recommend therapy, mental help to get rid of those PTSD memories.
It's that bad. In surgery, anesthesia going under timing is everything.
I mean, timing is everything in that.
And the same goes for public relations.
PR. Blue Cross Blue Shield, a health insurance company in the United States, announces that they will be making changes moving forward.
Let's say a very specific, lifesaving, life -altering surgery lasts about two hours on average.
But sometimes because everybody, every condition is different, there is going to be variations in surgery time.
If a customer's surgery lasts longer than two hours, Blue Cross Blue Shield will not cover the extra time under anesthesia.
So most ridiculous, what are they thinking?
When they release this change in policy, netizens on TikTok start asking Blue Cross Blue Shield, do you know you have 30 minutes?
That's what TikTokers were saying.
They write, LMAO, in this climate, somebody already ate the rich and now the world is waiting to see if any one of us is still hungry.
Within 24 hours, the representative for Blue Cross Blue Shield states there has been significant widespread misinformation about an update to our anesthesia policy.
As a result, we have decided not to proceed with the policy change.
To be clear, it never was and never will be the policy of Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield to not pay for medically necessary anesthesia services.
The proposed update to the policy was only designed to clarify the appropriateness of anesthesia consistent with well -established clinical guidelines.
They say we were trying to help you.
They say we realized based on the feedback that our communication about the policy was unclear, which is why we're rolling it back.
But is that really why?
Or is it because the CEO of UnitedHealthcare was just killed in broad daylight?
Brian Thompson is on his way to the annual UnitedHealth Group investors meeting.
It's going to be at the Hilton Midtown Hotel in Manhattan, which is not where he's staying for whatever purpose, perhaps safety.
He's staying at the Marriott down the block.
Then he's going to walk to the Hilton, which is just a few blocks away, to get ready to more or less tell the investors how much money they're going to be making this year.
I mean, just for transparency purposes, it's probably a really good day for Brian Thompson.
He's what's called a heavyweight.
In the industry under his leadership, UnitedHealthcare acquired over one million customers in 2023.
Total revenue grew by 14 .6 percent and net profit margins were 6 percent for 2023.
Probably better for 2024, which I see some people arguing about that 6 percent profit margins.
They're not the best profit margins in across the board industry, capitalistic societies.
But you're talking about a behemoth like UnitedHealthcare.
Their total revenue in 2023 was two hundred and seventy one point six billion dollars.
Six percent, six percent of that is twenty two point six billion dollars.
That is crazy. They are number eight in global companies for revenue, top companies for revenue globally.
Number four in the United States.
Wow. They're above Alphabet.
They're above Google.
It's been said that under Brian's leadership, stock prices roughly doubled, which makes sense because before he was appointed CEO, he had worked in the insurance industry for a really long time.
But he has no medical degree.
He's a CPA. He's also one of the many executives in the health care industry that decided to start denying patients claims and payments for what they, the insurer, believe to be non -critical visits to the E .R., A .K .A.
Hey, you random person with little or no medical knowledge sitting at home.
Please make sure that you're actually dying when you go to the E .R.
Like B for real, if you only think that you're dying 60 percent, maybe hold off because if you don't think that you're going to die, we're not going to pay for it.
If we think that you could have lived, we're not going to pay for it.
So you're going to pay for it and then you're going to be dying from the medical debt.
It got so bad that the chief executive of the American Hospital Association wrote an open letter to Brian Thompson, practically pleading him patients are not medical experts and should not be expected to self -diagnose during what they believe is a medical emergency.
Threatening patients with the financial penalty for making the wrong decision could have a chilling effect on seeking emergency care.
But that's clearly not the focus of the annual investors meeting that day in Manhattan.
The focus is how much money the company is making.
Six forty five a .m., Brian Thompson is walking to the Hilton Hotel.
He's about to reach the door when a hooded masked man walks up behind him.
First shot in the leg.
The second shot goes into his back and at least three shots are fired directly into Brian Thompson at a pretty close range.
And he drops dead. A few details to note.
The gun appears at least initially to malfunction, but the suspect is able to clear it calmly.
They are overwhelmingly calm, collected to the point where some people initially believe that this is a professional job.
Brian Thompson is clearly the target and the end goal is his death.
There's no robbery attempt.
No attempt to even talk to him.
It said the suspect loitered around waiting for Brian to arrive to the Hilton Hotel for perhaps like five minutes.
There's another person that's standing nearby when the suspect takes out their gun and starts firing.
They end up running off.
There's no attempt to harm that person or anybody else.
Just Brian Thompson.
When the shots are fired, Brian Thompson is down.
The suspect then walks into an alleyway before hopping onto a city bike and heading towards Central Park.
Brian Thompson is rushed to the hospital where he is pronounced dead.
In twenty twenty three, three hundred and eighty six people were killed in the city of New York.
That is more than one murder per day.
As with anyone else and their tragic murders, the show must still go on.
The same day, Rockefeller held its highly anticipated annual Christmas tree lighting while the suspect, the shooter, is still on the loose in Manhattan.
The NYPD hold this whole press conference to state that, quote, I want to be clear.
At this time, every indication is that this was a premeditated, preplanned, targeted attack, this does not appear to be a random act of violence.
Many people pass the suspect, but he appeared to wait for the intended target.
The NYPD commissioner states the shooter appeared to be lying in wait for several minutes before approaching the executive from behind and opening fire.
NYPD also highlight is this guy a pro or not?
They say the precision of the shooting, the use of a ghost gun and the escape on a bicycle suggests that this was not a random act by an amateur.
So speaking of a ghost gun, ghost guns are likely 3D printed guns.
That is crazy. How is that very common?
They say if you have enough motive, if you have enough technological knowledge, you can buy a 3D printer and do it.
Yeah, that's what a lot of experts are saying.
And they're really concerned about what this means because there's no way to track those.
Yeah. I mean, it's still, it's still wishy washy how to track regular guns.
Ghost guns are even harder.
Yeah. A lot of firearms experts stated online that watching the footage, this guy's got to be pro.
Some of them even state using a silencer in broad daylight.
There was a silencer on there, a 3D printed silencer is, and then casually biking away from the kill.
That's some calculated pro level stuff.
I mean, look at the precision in the shooting.
You don't, you don't get that aim without practice or at least being a pro.
One expert states, I mean, it doesn't necessarily mean that this shooter is a professional hitman.
It could also be a very determined, very well researched, very practiced individual.
One netizen disagrees, not a pro hitman, but feels like a hitman.
Others argue, well, usually hitmen are like ghosts in the night.
You don't see them.
You just know that they're there because now somebody's dead.
He was caught on CCTV footage shooting and killing Brian Thompson.
You could hardly call that a pro.
One comment reads, how could anyone miss at that range?
Yeah, it's a good hit, but come on, like a five year old could make that shot.
Another person comments, a trained marksman would have walked up with an arms reach and made one kill shot.
The main argument by those who do not believe him to be a professional being, I mean, if he in fact is a professional hitman, why would he be caught on CCTV camera?
But then others argue, what if that was the point?
One comment reads, if there had been no footage of the killing, the media impact and reach would be 50 % less.
He was both a professional shooter and motivated to hurt the company or something.
Regardless, the police reveal that they have a few strong leads that they're going to follow.
First, they release a few photos of the suspect, likely the most pertinent one being CCTV photos of him when he pulled his mask down to briefly smile at the front desk employee.
He is, okay, a lot of rumors online say that he is smiling at a Starbucks barista who he was flirting with.
Oh, yeah. Yes, but it's actually false.
He was perhaps flirting with the hostile worker and showed his smile.
But it's at the hostel that he was staying at prior to the shooting.
Yeah, one source states that the receptionist at the front desk asked to see his quote unquote pretty smile.
So he briefly pulled down his mask to show.
It is worth noting that he did allegedly stop by Starbucks prior to the shooting.
But the picture itself is not from there.
The police then release another photo along with that.
It is of the suspect in the back of a taxi car after leaving Central Park after the shooting.
So the one from before is at the hostel he's staying at, you can see him smiling.
Then the next one is of him masked up in the back of a taxi and the citywide manhunt is launched.
There's drones flying through the air.
Canine dogs are sniffing every leaf covered planter in Central Park.
They've got divers diving into the lakes at Central Park wearing full -on scuba gear.
They're going into the lake for three, four days.
To which netizens have said, let's be honest, would they have done this all for a regular citizen?
The answer is no. It would take months for a regular citizen to get any sort of resources used for their case, if ever.
It's important to rule out any fish.
So the NYPD must go fishing.
Not only that, they're sending NYPD officers to Atlanta, New Jersey, Connecticut.
It's turning into a full blown national manhunt.
Officers stopped an entire train.
They stopped a train dead in its tracks, searched it from top to bottom.
Nothing of interest was found.
I mean, they searched the entire thing.
They had to rule out all of the train rats.
One NYPD spokesperson said, we are getting tips.
It's helping. We are following up on every tip that's come in, which of course is what should happen in every single murder case.
But it never happens unless that same someone is worth 50 million dollars.
So it goes without saying.
New Yorkers feel like there's enough people looking for the suspects.
It probably felt like the entire force of the NYPD officers is out there.
So why should New Yorkers help?
They don't get paid enough for this.
In fact, New Yorkers are out there purchasing the same jacket and the same backpack to the point where both are sold out.
Crazy netizens. Right.
It's a shame. My health care doesn't cover vision because I didn't see shit.
Another reads, oh, so they want us to play cop for free.
Yeah, no. Even when the FBI puts up a reward for 50 ,000 dollars leading to the arresting conviction of the backpack shooter and the NYPD is offering up to another 10 ,000 dollars, nobody wants to help.
Instead, social media comments read, do we, the people have to pay those FBI reward dollars.
Why? Besides, can they not just narrow down the suspect?
I mean, the police know that the suspect knew that United Health Group was holding an investor conference at the hotel that day.
They knew what route Brian Thompson was going to take, which means this could be one of the many disgruntled employees that were laid off for profits or it could be a customer of United Health Care.
So that suspect list would include almost the entirety of the US population.
Millions upon millions of people.
But the NYPD want your help.
And they say that backpack is going to be a treasure trove of evidence.
That backpack, I mean, it could have the murder weapon in the backpack.
It could have any other identifying information in the backpack.
This is going to be the big break in the case that they so desperately need.
And they find the backpack in Central Park.
They find it. The NYPD unzipped the backpack.
They pull out the first item of interest, a Tommy Hilfiger jacket.
They're like, what is that?
The backpack was just sitting there, Central Park.
It was left. Yes. On purpose to be found.
And then they reach in, pull out the next thing.
The only other thing really in the backpack of interest.
A stack of Monopoly money.
Late 2023, the Department of Justice, the DOJ, launches an antitrust monopoly investigation into United Health Group.
They're being investigated for being a monopoly.
There are probably a list of 1069 reasons why the DOJ would probably want to investigate United Health Group, but one of the biggest points of contention being there is a subsidiary of United called Optum.
Optum provides health services.
They have hospitals, private practices all across the United States.
Meanwhile, United Health Care is the insurance arm.
So now United owns providers.
They own the doctors.
They have a pharmaceutical division.
They have the insurance division.
They also recently purchased Change Health, which is the processing claim, like the IT division.
That's where doctors go on there to process their claims to get insurance money from United.
So they own pretty much everything.
It's a vertical monopoly, some would say.
It's been said that United owns or is affiliated with about 90 ,000 physicians, which is about 10 % of all doctors in the United States.
The DOJ wants to know if United favors its own physician sites, directing or even forcing insurance holders to go there rather than to any other doctor or provider, even if it's better for them to keep as much money in United's house, circulating between one subsidiary to the other, to the next, to
the next. They also have pharmaceutical arms, like I said, the claims processor.
United is also the main insurer for Medicare, Medicaid and Obamacare plans.
But what really kicks off this investigation is United tries to acquire a massive hospice provider for $3 .3 billion and the DOJ is trying to stop them.
Like do they really need another arm in their business?
On a global scale, United Health Group falls at number eight in top companies by revenue.
On the US scale, like I said, they're number four behind Walmart, Amazon, Apple, and then it's United Health Group.
They're above Berkshire Hathaway, Exxon, Google, Alphabet, Costco, even JP Morgan Chase, they're above.
The assistant attorney general states American healthcare is unwell.
Unless this $3 .3 billion transaction is stopped, United will further extend its grip to health and hospice care, threatening seniors, their families and nurses.
As of right now, the DOJ is still investigating United for antitrust concerns and interestingly, a lot of people did not even know that they were being investigated until this happened, until they found the monopoly money.
Even more interesting is that Brian Thompson is not only the CEO of UnitedHealthcare that is obviously being investigated by the DOJ, but he is named in another class action lawsuit filed, alleging that Brian Thompson knew that the DOJ was going to investigate UnitedHealth Group.
And before that information was made public because this is a publicly traded company, he allegedly sold over $15 million of his personally held UnitedHealth Group shares.
Insider trading is the allegation, which had he not sold the shares and allegedly partake in this alleged insider trading, he would have likely lost about $800 ,000 in shareholder value, which don't get me wrong.
It's a lot of money, but Brian Thompson, the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, the insurance swing, he makes about $10 million a year in total comp.
So that's his salary bonuses as well as stock options.
Most of it actually comes from stock, 6 million or so to be exact.
Regardless, his total comp is about 8 figures a year.
That $800 ,000? I don't know if that would have changed his life.
Again, I'm not saying he was committing insider trading or that $800 ,000 was the reason he sold his shares.
I'm just saying, I'm not saying anything is what I'm saying, but I will say the way mainstream media outlets have described his insider trading allegation is fascinating.
One outlet writes, Thompson found himself named in a class action lawsuit alleging insider trading.
The lawsuit claimed he and other executives sold millions in stocks while withholding information about a DOJ investigation into UnitedHealth's business practices.
Despite these legal battles, Thompson remained steadfast in his commitment to steering the company towards innovation and growth.
His ability to lead during times of turbulence earned him respect from industry peers.
That's a interesting way to look at this.
That is a fascinating, fascinating blurb on this crime.
I mean, could we, should we start doing that to every alleged criminal?
It's fascinating. That is the way mainstream media has spoken about Brian Thompson and his alleged crimes and ultimately his death.
The sentiment cannot be shared with social media users.
On Spotify, you can create these oddly specific playlists.
Like there's one titled the masculine urge to stand outside all alone in the snow.
Another one is songs that make me feel like I'm slowly drowning in a bathtub in a dimly lit room.
Another one reads when the zombie apocalypse finally happens, but you make no effort to survive or a recently created one, oddly specific POV taken out of the CEO.
The thumbnail is the picture of the suspect smiling and there are 71 songs on there.
The list of songs include Welcome to New York by Taylor Swift, Angel with a Shotgun, Do You Hear the People Sing, Troubles Coming, and My Shot.
Over 10 ,000 users saved it and are bopping to songs about the CEO assassin as some have dubbed the suspect.
That's what they're calling him.
I mean, is this a normal reaction?
I guess that's the debate here.
Others are taking to Twitter to post pictures, zoomed in and cleaned up images.
Like, you know, in those movies, I like zoom in the FBI as I clear up the picture, unblur it.
And it's the suspect when he briefly takes off his mask.
And when you see this clarified HD photo, it is so clear that the suspect is Mr.
Beast, Nancy Pelosi, Ben Shapiro, the cat from Sabrina and the Teenage Witch.
They're just photoshopping faces onto the assassin's photo.
You're saying memes.
You are making memes.
So many memes. Another viral tweet just reads, just left an anonymous tip and reported Amy Schumer for shooting that UnitedHealthcare CEO or simply thoughts and deductibles, praying hands emoji.
I would say after digging through the depths of Twitter and TikTok and Reddit, 70 to 80 percent, if not more of the interactions on this case, lie somewhere between haha, this is great to not great, but I'm not going to cry about it either.
Also, that name is kind of funny.
That's where I would say 70 to 80 percent of the reactions lie.
While the others are upset that the public is condoning violence and wants netizens to take a really good hard look at the fact that he is a husband and a father.
Brian's wife, I believe they're separated.
Like, I don't know if they're strange, but I don't think that they were living together.
She gives a statement that says we are shattered to hear about the senseless killing of our beloved Brian.
Brian was an incredibly generous, loving, talented man who truly lived life to the fullest and touched so many lives.
Most importantly, Brian was incredibly loving father to our two sons and will be greatly missed.
That said, someone on Twitter creates an account called the ghost of Brian Thompson and is just going around commenting on people's nightmare UnitedHealthcare experiences.
One tweet reads, I had a stroke and UnitedHealthcare moved me from the top stroke center in the state to another hospital because the E .R.
I went to was out of network.
My doctor made them wait until I was out of the ICU.
They refused to cover the ambulance they made me take to the other hospital.
The ghost of Brian Thompson responds.
That's the Twitter account name.
It's not United's fault that you had a stroke.
You made the life choices that got you where you are.
Merry Christmas. This is crazy.
Netizens are commenting things like this is getting more coverage than what UnitedHealthcare has ever provided.
Sending prior authorization, denied claims, collections, and prayers to his family.
People also comment, was his trip to the E .R.
really emergent? According to his own company, my husband's heart attack was in an actual emergency and we were out the full deductible.
So I'm just saying.
Others say, I can't even pretend to care.
I hope he's looking up at us.
Another comment reads, will his family still be billed?
Did the E .R. wait to render care until they confirmed his coverage?
I'm not certain the hospital was medically necessary.
Did he try his primary care physician first after getting shot?
Was the hospital in network?
Did he really need to go to the E .R.?
Why didn't he try urgent care first?
To which one netizen finally puts their foot down and responds to the comments writing, why would you awful people say such awful things that restore my faith in humanity?
They also argue, besides he wasn't assassinated.
His claim to life was just denied.
Other netizens were more focused on the monopoly money and how the suspect is toying with the police.
They wrote, bro is really out here being Robin hood and trolling the FBI.
LOL. He said you guys are playing checkers and I'm playing monopoly.
He has the NYPD solving puzzles.
LMAO. He's the Riddler.
Others point out how this is not really funny because someone out there is actually having a really bad day.
They write someone somewhere has a box with a monopoly board and is going to sit down and play one day and wonder where all the damn money went.
That is the only victim in this story.
Many legacy media outlets have argued that the surge of social media post quote, glorifying the shooting is alarming.
One argues the framing of this incident as some opening blow in a class war and not a brutal murder is especially alarming.
But netizens are not having it.
They're writing, trying to convince me that the CEO shooter is a danger to anybody else is the biggest corporate media joke of the week.
One netizen pushes back on the mainstream media strong interest in the case writing, the real news isn't the murder of the United healthcare CEO.
It's how many Americans don't care and are actively celebrating his death.
Okay. They also write that about 65 ,000 people in the United States die per year because they're not covered by insurance or they're underinsured.
65 ,000 one netizen writes, thoughts and prayers that this happens to all other CEOs, which is honestly a crazy thing to say.
I worry that you should take that down because people are getting arrested these days.
Another netizen writes, I submitted a claim for my condolences, but it got denied.
So sad. Mainstream media news anchors have been replaying people's Tik talks of them saying things like, I'm not sad about it.
And they're expressing disgust.
They're commenting, joking about somebody's murder like that is absolutely disgusting.
A family is grieving right now.
To which netizens have responded, sometimes unreasonable men must do unreasonable things.
Another comments, you're right.
It would have been better if the CEO lived and was subsequently denied care for his injuries by his healthcare provider.
That would have been real justice.
Another netizen writes, people have been so happy on here for the past few days.
I think it might be the first time UnitedHealthcare has ever helped with mental health.
One of the main reasons that people are so upset with UnitedHealthcare is if you want to look at it this way.
This is legally, I don't know if I can say this is what they do.
This is what it feels like they do.
Feels. That's a opinion.
You pay them to insure you for healthcare.
To insure you for life -saving treatments should it come to it.
And most of the time, you don't even give them your money by choice.
Because I do see some international netizens wondering, wait, if everyone in America hates UnitedHealthcare, why are they still in business?
Why are you guys using UnitedHealthcare?
There really is no market for insurance.
A lot of times it's what's offered to you at work.
Corporate healthcare plans are sometimes cheaper with UnitedHealthcare.
Employers will go with United because they are looking out for themselves rather than their employees.
So now so many Americans are stuck with UnitedHealthcare because they have no choice.
And even though they had no choice, they still have to pay UnitedHealthcare massive premiums every single month, hundreds of dollars, if not more, depending on who you are and if you have any conditions.
And then once they finally go to the doctor to get the care that they need, they file a claim to United saying, hey, remember how I pay you so much money.
Probably more money than I spend on groceries every month.
Yeah, well, this is why.
Remember, please pay the provider for this X -ray I had done because I could have died.
The claim still has to be approved by United.
United has the highest claim denial rate in the industry.
The industry average being around 16%, United denies claims over 30 % of the time.
A third. Imagine you're going through a fast food drive -through.
You pay money and a third of the time you may not get your food.
In fact, you may owe more money.
Here is one Reddit review of United before the killing of Brian Thompson.
This is from two years ago.
It reads, my son and I were on United for a year.
It was the worst experience I ever had with insurance.
They denied every little thing.
We would have to spend hours on the phone with them.
Eventually, they would pay the claim that we would have to get the state insurance commissioner involved in an ER visit that they didn't want to pay.
Eventually, they paid it only to reverse their decision six months later.
Once again, we spent months fighting it and eventually they paid it.
I hate this company.
And if my employer ever decides to go with United Healthcare, I would strongly think about finding another job.
One comment under that reads, I'm having the same issues right now, denying all my claims.
Now I'm being billed thousands of dollars for routine blood work.
One ER nurse on TikTok says the things I've seen dying patients get denied for by insurance makes me physically sick.
I just can't feel sympathy for Brian Thompson because of all those patients and their families.
Another healthcare worker writes, I work in hospital utilization management.
United Healthcare is literally the worst payer and it's not even by a close margin.
In my extensive firsthand experience, they deny medically necessary services in bad faith constantly.
I would never use them.
United denies, denies, denies anything they can.
I hate them. Another review from one year ago, again, way before the killing of Brian Thompson reads, the company is targeting senior citizens with cheap so -called Medicare Advantage plans and denying coverage left and right.
They are literally driving people to their graves.
Another netizen writes, it's scary, but I'm not surprised something like this finally bubbled up, especially with the current dynamic in our society.
It's akin to pitchforks and torches.
The health system is a scam and somebody finally snapped.
Another netizen points out their business model is predicated on systematically denying customers vital care.
They are effectively stealing billions in profits.
So for example, United Healthcare makes billions, hundreds of billions of dollars from all those insurance premiums and they're incentivized to pay out less claims so they can hoard more money to themselves.
There's actually a law that you have to pay out a certain percentage of the monthly premiums that you receive.
United did not. So they actually had to pay back consumers, I think like 7 % of their annual premium.
Wow, that is crazy.
So that was a whole thing.
Okay, so basically they are taking $100 in, for example, every month from the, you know, where you pay and they pay out.
Let's say the law says you have to pay at least 50 % of that at least.
Yeah, probably more like $30.
Okay. At least 30 % of dollar of that you need to pay for those medical procedures and they are under, they only pay $23.
They're like fine, here's $7.
Let me pay the patients.
$7, $1. Yes. Because, yeah, I mean you do without what you will, that information.
United also provided the health insurance plans for students at Penn State University, not to be confused with UPenn, which is important later, but I digress, okay.
But at Penn State University, this was like a huge thing of what happened with United Healthcare.
They are going to provide insurance plans for students.
It is a lucrative business model.
Very healthy young students.
I mean, Penn State University, you're talking about middle upper class students that probably take good care of their health have been at this point.
They're athletic, they work out, they, you know, they're good.
Paying every single month, most of them don't really need that much medical help.
Just some routine checkups, that's it.
But one student at Penn State was costing United Healthcare $2 million a year.
He has ulcerative colitis, severe arthritis, debilitating diarrhea.
He has bloody diarrhea 40 to 50 times a day.
And I know someone might be like, oh, well I have diarrhea.
This is to the point he cannot engage in any normal activities.
He cannot play sports.
He cannot even go outside.
He can't even go to the store to pick up apples because he could have debilitating diarrhea in the middle of the store.
He has fatigue. He has life potentially life threatening blood clots.
To treat him, it was costing United Healthcare $2 million a year.
But now they don't want to pay that anymore, even though he's insured, even though he pays for their services.
This is the social contract and it's pretty much a contract, but they don't want it.
Christopher needs that care.
In 2021, a phone call is recorded by a United nurse.
So she's a nurse that's affiliated with United Healthcare and her colleague that works at United Healthcare.
They're talking about how a doctor reviewed Christopher's case and decided he does not medically need all the medications he's on.
You know, like the things that are keeping him a normal human being.
He doesn't need it, which means, which means if a doctor can say Christopher does not need the medications that are quite literally saving his life, United does not need to pay for it anymore.
And they laugh about it in this recorded phone call.
They also go on to rant about how Christopher's mother keeps calling, quote, screaming and yelling and throwing tantrums.
Yeah, because her son could die, but I guess that's funny.
They both state that for the family to appeal the denial of treatment would be a waste of the family's time and money.
So there's nothing that they can do about getting this potentially lifesaving treatment denied.
One of them remarks, we're still going to say no, regardless.
Christopher and his family end up suing.
That's how this call is released through those court documents.
This is how United Healthcare is talking about their customers that pay every single month.
They laugh when they deny lifesaving care.
They also bury doctors reports that told United, Hey, if you alter Christopher's medications, that would be very dangerous for his health.
They did not care. When all this came to light, a United spokesperson said Christopher's treatment involves medication dosages that far exceed FDA guidelines.
In cases like this, we review treatment plans based on his current clinical guidelines to help ensure patient safety, which is not true.
One of Christian's doctors wrote, this is not a typical case.
He's very young. His condition is very extreme.
Of course, we cannot stick to FDA guidelines.
It's just not going to work for him.
The FDA guidelines are there for the mass general public.
And it's just a guideline.
And they write his disease is significantly severe with a diagnosis at a young age.
He has failed every biologic medication class recommendations by guidelines.
Therefore guidelines can no longer be applied to this case.
This is what's working.
We tried lowering his meds.
It didn't work. So the United healthcare is saying that we did it for him.
That's exactly what Blue Cross Blue Shield was saying.
Oh, right. They're saying people are getting too much anesthesia.
So we're doing it for you and everyone's saying you're not doing anything for us.
Yeah. You're crazy.
If you think that this is such crazy gas lighting on a corporate level on top of that, Christopher's parents, they both work at Penn State University, their faculty.
So they were talking to this person that was the medium between Penn State University and United healthcare because it's the coverage that all the students get and originally that person was going to the bat.
They were trying to help get the United to play, pay all these claims.
And then out of nowhere, that person becomes way less helpful.
And they wonder why this was not publicly released to anybody.
But turns out in the midst of all of this, she is now fully employed by United and no longer the university.
Originally she was employed by the university.
So her interests lie with her students.
But now United has taken her on as an employee.
She still works at the university and she's still the middleman, but she works for United.
She does not work for the university.
So whose interest is she protecting?
That's fucking crazy.
And nobody was informed about that.
They bought her off, basically.
Yes. They say here, here's a fatter salary.
Come work for us. Yes.
So we don't have to pay 2 million dollars on this thing.
I don't know if it was solely because of Christopher's case.
One could maybe potentially in their opinion connect the dots to that, but it is very suspicious, is it not?
And the fact that even without Christopher's case, whose best interests are we serving?
It's not the students anymore.
Yeah. It's going to be United.
Yeah. Yeah. So like, I think Christopher might be a small part of it.
That now she might want to look out for more money across the board.
For United. For United.
This is what Monopoly is.
You control like it's conflict of interest.
Yeah, this is a major conflict of interest.
It's crazy. And just out in the open at Penn State University.
United also states that Christopher, they're not treating Christopher.
These are not treatment conditions.
This is where it gets so confusing.
They say we don't know his exact medical history.
So we don't want to treat him.
Those treatment decisions are made between him and his physicians.
But Christopher and everybody else is arguing, but if you're denying coverage for the treatment that the doctor recommends, are you not dictating how he gets treatment?
Are you not suddenly playing doctor?
Christopher states the insurer United is playing doctor, making decisions without ever examining him or even speaking with him.
Because these were the only medications that ever made him not house bound and feel somewhat normal to return back to a state where he could not do anything.
Christopher said that he contemplated self exiting.
If the coverage was ultimately denied, they are still engaged in a legal battle.
I believe that they settled out of court, but it was messy.
One netizen states United Healthcare.
That's what it should be called.
Some netizens say that the CEOs and billionaires of major corporations should feel like their actions have consequences, not the consequence of murder.
Right. But it's kind of the situation of, I guess, if a celebrity were to do something, there would be some backlash.
A lot of CEOs and major corporations, there's some backlash, but not really.
It doesn't affect them.
They don't wish to be liked by the general public.
Yeah, they wish for their bottom line to be fat.
One netizen comments, billionaires and CEOs should see the fact that the entire internet is having a week long celebration for one of their own's death.
And they should really think about what that means.
Again, that's not a threat.
They're saying, think about how we got here.
Think about what you're doing with your life.
But some of them have taken to making jokes, writing, my Amazon order is four days late at Jeff Bezos.
You seen what happened to the other guy?
Stop playing. I will say most people seem to carry the sentiment, but some others disagree.
One netizen rants on Twitter, United Health Group's profit margins are only six to eight percent.
That means keeping the same amount of coverage, but lowering their premiums by eight percent would make them completely unprofitable.
We as a society is, by and large, financially innumerate and illiterate.
It blames health insurance companies for high cost of health care.
If this were true, GEICO would also be responsible for high car prices and progressive home insurance for high house prices.
Salaries account for 60 to 80 percent of hospital expenditures.
You know why health care costs are so high?
Because our doctors make more than double compared to German and Swedish doctors.
That's the reason they pay half of what we pay.
Which is a fascinating argument.
I don't know why this netizen has taken it upon themselves to worry about if United is making billions or a few less billions of pure profit per year, which is enlightening and fascinating of a take.
But another netizen response, the only reason that doctors get paid higher here than other countries is because the education is more expensive here.
There are hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt.
You can trace this and it's going to be like the chicken and the egg story.
What came first? Other netizens are just calling the original poster corporate bootlicker, wondering what they get out of defending a soulless mega corporation that denies health care to paying customers.
Others argue, even if all of this is true, that does not give anyone the right to shoot the man dead on a public street in the middle of the day.
We have courts for those things.
To which netizens argue, it's adorable that you have faith in the rule of law when your country is run by bureaucrats, twisting the system in their favor, ensuring the status quo remains the same.
All of us little people stay at the bottom for the elite to use and exploit to enrich themselves further.
To which a whole fight ensues.
So you're saying it's OK to murder someone secretly or openly because they've been accused of doing bad things?
Accused is not convicted.
Accused of insider training.
Another netizen response.
Almost every policy decision made by United had to pass over his desk.
Every family bankrupted and every person that died because they couldn't get the proper medical care was on his hands.
Why do you protect the elite who walked all over us and don't give a fuck about you?
To which someone responds, people can start a class action lawsuit and they will always have lawyers coming out of the woodwork to help them.
Individuals are a little more dicey, but it can be done through the court.
You don't have to murder someone.
Many netizens have written back where exactly can we hold these CEOs accountable?
Poor people have zero access to the court system.
It's pay to play. Wake up and look around for fuck's sake.
Another comment reads courts for filthy rich white collar criminals.
Yeah, that's freaking hilarious.
Tell me more about this imaginary world you live in.
One netizen expresses disappointment in society, writing.
If this was your dad, you would not say horrible things.
I live in Minneapolis and I can tell you his family is wonderful.
He is not the sole decision maker.
It's a huge corporation, sad that health care is all going downhill.
Starts with the drug companies and people living longer.
To which people comment funny how when United says it to people who have policies, it's not horrible.
Another comment reads denying people health care after people have paid into that system as a whole new level of evil.
Another netizen writes cowardly killer shot him in the back.
Damn, I hope they capture him and apply the weight of the law.
Cue the top comment reading.
Yeah, yeah, rest and Piss.
Brian Thompson. Another debate inducing comment reads.
It's very sad. Many people have lost their minds in moral clarity.
How can you celebrate the death of just a guy in a position to do his job and people compare him to Hitler?
Folks, the guy was a human being who has loved ones like us who are mourning him right now, please have some sympathy and maybe a little class.
Many netizens have taken on the viewpoint that you live by the sword, you die by the sword.
They write when you punch down on the week and poor, you get what you deserve.
I will say it seems like politically speaking, both sides, most Americans are at least supporting the suspect or if not, not caring and feeling sympathy for Brian Thompson.
So it's very interesting that both sides of the aisle are more or less united.
One netizen sentiment sums it up pretty well.
I've seen these responses throughout Reddit and I cannot blame the reaction of many.
Where's the equal amount of media coverage on millions of people being denied health care because of these insurance companies or those going nearly bankrupt to cover what their insurance companies won't.
Americans are dying because of their greed and it's making it nearly impossible to feel anything close to sympathy at this point with the overwhelming sentiment being quote, this might be the one time if not all of America is united.
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Five days after Brian Thompson's murder, Larry and his friends meet up at McDonald's.
Larry and his friends always go to this McDonald's.
They're sitting around eating their regular orders when Larry says, you know, one of my friends, and I thought he was kidding.
When the shooter or who am I assume is the shooter, came into the McDonald's.
He made this comment, this little guy walks in and he says, well, that looks like the shooter from New York.
And you know, the whole group of us thought it was a joke.
We were kidding about it.
And as it turned out, it was him.
The employee said that they thought that that was him.
You know, I guess that's what started the initial investigation on it, you know, and I am Larry's talking to who he's telling the news station.
So he's saying he's sitting at McDonald's with all of his buddies.
And this guy walks in with a mask and a hood and a backpack.
And they're like, that guy looks like the New York City shooter.
Ha ha ha ha. Because, you know, what are the odds that he's in Altoona, Pennsylvania, 200 and what, 86 miles away from New York City.
So random. And this is a very small town in Pennsylvania.
And they're like, he, he, ha, giggling.
But I guess the employee overhears at McDonald's sees the guy when he's ordering and decides, you know what?
I think that's the shooter and calls 911.
Larry and his friends leave before the police arrive and then later it's all over the news.
The shooter has been caught at a McDonald's in Altoona, Pennsylvania.
So Larry says he goes back to the McDonald's.
He asked the employees, was that the guy was at this McDonald's that he was arrested in?
And they said, yeah, he said, was I there?
And the employee told him, you were sitting right there in front of him.
You were making jokes that he was the shooter.
He thought that was crazy.
He said, I mean, he must have heard us when he walked in.
But he had no reaction because we were talking pretty loudly.
We were right there.
They said that the shooter was sitting in the corner eating hash browns.
He does note that he was surprised that the shooter stayed as long as he did, considering he's on the run.
But again, at the time, he did not really think that.
Larry did not think that that was the United shooter.
But one of the employees at McDonald's clearly did.
A 26 year old man is promptly arrested at McDonald's.
And I'm sure you've all seen the news by now.
That man is Luigi Mangione.
He was considered a missing person.
His mom filed a missing persons report for him November 18th of this year.
But apparently he hasn't been in contact with his family for the past few months.
In his backpack, police allege there was a 3D printed ghost gun, a 3D printed silencer, a loaded Glock magazine with six nine millimeter rounds and apparently multiple fake IDs, including one that was allegedly used to check into the New York City hotel by the person of interest in the pictures.
There was a U .S. passport, ten thousand dollars in cash.
The police alleged that there was eight thousand dollars in USD and two thousand dollars in foreign currency, which is going to be debated later.
They state that there was clothes, face masks that were similar to what the suspect used, as well as a water bottle and a kind bar wrapper with fingerprints allegedly matching those found near the crime scene.
They also state that they found a spiral notebook containing entries and thoughts, as well as almost like to do lists, as well as a three page manifesto that legacy media did not want to release.
All these networks had his manifesto in possession.
You're kidding me. They would.
Yes, they would quote from it here and there.
Ken Klippenstein is the independent journalist that released it.
And he writes, my queries to The New York Times, Washington Post, CNN and NBC to explain their rationale for withholding the manifesto while gladly quoting from it selectively have not been answered.
That is some wild stuff.
Yeah, I mean, the research for this case was.
Very disorienting, I would go on to mainstream media and the rhetoric, the tone was so disconnected from even their own comment section, even though not even just Twitter and TikTok, their own comments sections, their own audience.
Yeah, their own audience is like, are you dumb?
Yeah. But the manifesto reads in full to the feds.
I'll keep this short because I do respect what you do for our country.
To save you a lengthy investigation, I state plainly that I wasn't working with anyone.
This was fairly trivial.
Some elementary social engineering, basic C .A .D.
and a lot of patience.
The spiral notebook, if present, has some straggling notes and to do lists that illuminate the gist of it.
My tech is pretty locked down because I work in engineering, so probably not much info in there.
I do apologize for any strife or trauma, but it had to be done.
Frankly, these parasites simply had it coming.
A reminder, the U .S.
has the number one most expensive health care system in the world, yet we rank roughly 42 in life expectancy.
United is the largest company in the U .S.
by market cap behind only Apple, Google, Wal -Mart.
It has grown and grown.
But has our life expectancy?
No, the reality is these indecipherable words have simply gotten too powerful and they continue to abuse our country for immense profit because the American public has allowed them to get away with it.
Obviously, the problem is more complex, but I do not have space.
And frankly, I do not pretend to be the most qualified person to lay out the full argument.
But many have illuminated the corporation and greed decades ago.
And the problem simply remain.
It is not an issue of awareness at this point, but clearly power games at play.
Evidently, I am the first to face it with such brutal honesty.
The spiral notebook, at least as of right now, hasn't been fully released.
But there are sources that state he had a brief ideas, considerations of bombing Manhattan, but decided against it because it would, quote, kill innocents.
So he went for a far more targeted approach, writing.
So then what do you do?
You go to the annual parasitic bean counter convention to whack the CEO.
It's targeted, precise and doesn't risk innocence.
What would be better than killing the CEO at his own bean counting conference?
Bean counting is. Like just I don't know.
I would picture. The Lord of the Rings counting a little rings and beans.
Which side note, let's not forget this is alleged.
You can write whatever you want on whatever piece of notebook in your possession that would be free speech, right?
So just keep in mind, people are innocent till proven guilty in the court of law.
Perhaps the Luigi was so delusional that he truly believed that United's top executives gathered together to count how many pinto beans they each have.
Right. Everybody is innocent until proven guilty.
You can write whatever you want.
That doesn't necessarily imply guilt.
Or maybe he thought this was a plot of a movie that he could sell to Netflix.
Again, take everything with a grain of salt.
But the police are saying this is like a slam dunk case.
Just saying in his goodreads account, he did state that he wanted to read the biography of the creator of the atomic bomb.
And he did rate the Unabomber's book four stars.
So there's that. However, what does that even really mean?
Right. I could rate any book five stars.
In the midst of researching this case was when Luigi Mangione was arrested while I was in the midst of researching and the shitstorm just began.
This man's entire digital footprint comes out within a day or two since his arrest and probably more so trickling.
And now they found netizens found his Twitter account.
This guy seems very normal.
He liked posts about caffeine.
It's amazing how caffeine really is the only drug that has reached this level of social acceptance.
Imagine someone saying the first line of cocaine in the morning is one of my favorite things in life, or without my morning joint, I can't function.
He liked this or just a forum screenshot.
Again, not his words, just a repost.
But maybe it can shed some light on his viewpoints.
The screenshot is of someone asking the question, what are your thoughts on this quote?
It is no measure of good health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.
Someone responds, those who feel strong aversion to adjusting to a maladjusted society are deemed mentally ill, alcoholics, substance abusers or slackers.
They are corralled into a 12 step group and or a mental hospital or placed on medication or even just shunned, all in the attempt to make them conform and fit in when what really needs to happen is change in the society itself.
He repost another quote.
Being smart makes you more prone to confirmation bias.
Luigi allegedly elaborates on this viewpoint, stating in retrospect, it shouldn't have been surprising.
Confirmation bias is what happens when that little lawyer in your head takes control of your thinking process and smart people have a very smart little lawyer in there to which netizens have commented.
Yeah, well, you better get a lawyer or a call.
They find Luigi's Instagram, which has since been taken down.
His Goodreads account, like I was telling you, also taken down his LinkedIn.
And it shows that he graduated in 2020 with a bachelor's degree from the Ivy League UPenn and then eventually went on to get a master's in computer science and minor in mathematics.
He was even valedictorian at his private prep school.
He went to Gilman. It's this elite all boys school that costs nearly forty thousand dollars per year for high school.
He he gave a valedictorian speech where he explains the teachers at Gilman influenced me especially.
They encouraged less of a desire to achieve high grades, but instead encouraged more of an excitement to explore academic topics outside of the classroom.
While netizens are constructing this profile of the alleged shooter, they're getting more confused because I don't think this is who they thought it would be in the beginning.
And it seems like this is what netizens describe as the health care industry's worst case scenario of who the shooter could be, because the shooter is not a minority.
The shooter is not from an underprivileged class.
The shooter is well educated, Ivy League educated from a privileged class is a white, attractive male.
It's a very interesting profile that starts coming together.
He says that he wanted to study biology and AI.
He was on the robotics team.
Side note, former classmates of Luigi's have spoken out.
And one former classmate says he was like a leader in our class.
I mean, everyone knew him as this quiet, reserved, nice kid.
He's obviously very intelligent.
Everyone could tell that by his resume, of course.
It's been said that even his family is of a very prominent, influential family in Maryland.
His grandfather allegedly made a lot of money as a real estate developer who owned country clubs, nursing homes.
They are related to health care.
They have connections to health care and even a radio station.
He passed away in 2008 from a stroke.
His grandmother passed away in 2023 from Parkinson's.
So Luigi's grandparents, they pass away.
But his parents themselves are also doing well for themselves in the family business.
There's actually quite a lot of debates on whether or not Luigi and his family could potentially be wealthier than Brian Thompson.
Wow. Brian Thompson's net worth is estimated to be around 43 million dollars.
It is unclear what the Mangione's are worth exactly, but people find it an interesting discussion.
Perhaps even more riveting is the fact that Luigi is allegedly included in a will from his grandmother that could be anywhere between 30 million to 100 million dollars.
It's not just for Luigi himself, but they have a very large Italian family.
Anybody who is charged and convicted of a felony forfeits their right to any inheritance.
So it appears that if that is true, Luigi does not care for money.
And there's a lot of money in his family.
They donated over a million dollars to the local hospital, Greater Baltimore Medical Center.
The unit for high risk obstetrics has the Mangione family name on there.
They have the Mangione family foundation that supports nonprofit health care facilities.
They run a real estate health care connected empire with nursing homes.
Even more fascinating is Luigi's immediate cousin is Nino Mangione.
He's a Maryland state delegate known to be quite conservative.
He describes himself as quote conservative Republican fighting for freedom and the future of Maryland.
He actually had to cancel his political fundraisers because of Luigi's arrest.
He states because of the nature of this terrible condition involving my cousin, I do not believe it is appropriate to hold fundraising events scheduled this Thursday.
I want to thank you for your thoughts and prayers and support.
My family and I are heartbroken and ask that you remember the family of Mr.
Thompson and your prayers.
But like I said, it appears that Luigi has not been in contact with this very wealthy family because they reported him missing a month ago and they state that they haven't spoken to him in months.
And I think once people start digging into Luigi, getting his Twitter Goodreads Instagram, the question is why did he kill Brian Thompson, the CEO of United Health Care?
One of the last quotes that he ever liked on Goodreads is from the Dr.
Seuss book The Lorax.
It reads, unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better.
It's not. Some netizens have joked that the Lorax radicalized Luigi.
But is that really why?
The shell casings on the bullet used to kill Brian Thompson, there were three left behind at the crime scene, and there were three words etched into each of the bullets.
One bullet says delay.
The next one says deny.
And the last one, interestingly, says depose.
Depose means to remove someone from office or power to dethrone someone.
Oh, my God, I didn't know it was like three separate ones.
I thought it was all engraved on one of them.
Three separate ones.
Three shots fired. That's even more like a lot of thought, a lot of planning.
Now, it seems to be a reference to the book called Delay, Deny, Defend, which is a book written about how insurance companies get away with denying care and denying claims.
Literally, they will deny and delay the payment of justified claims.
Deny payment altogether.
And then eventually they'll defend their actions by forcing customers to enter in these very pricey litigations that they know that they're not capable of doing.
One netizen writes online, when I delivered my son 16 years ago, I had two different insurance plans, one through my employer and another through my husband's employer.
Both of them were allegedly united.
Two plans, right? So better coverage, right?
Wrong. United Health Care spent months arguing with itself over which of our plans would cover what medical expenses, during which time the hospital were still billing me, sending me to collections, etc.
My son then got sick at seven weeks.
Another hospitalization, another round of arguing which plan was going to pay what.
Long story short, fifteen thousand dollars in medical bills within seven weeks.
Two insurance plans, bankruptcy due to medical bills that United Health Care wouldn't cover because it couldn't figure out which of their two policies was going to pay for it.
Bankruptcy, two insurance plans, got to love United Health Care.
Delay, deny, defend.
Another writes, my mom is currently dealing with United Health Care, saying she has almost reached her lifetime max and they will not cover anything after she reaches it.
She has maybe a month or two left.
She has stage four cancer and there was no evidence of disease, but she gets treatment every three weeks to keep the cancer away.
My parents have tried everything.
Marketplace insurance does not cover her drugs.
She tried to get a job just for insurance, but hasn't found anything.
Now we just found out that her cancer is back and she is starting new chemo.
Her doctor's advice was for my mom to divorce my dad so she could qualify for Medicaid.
What kind of country do we live in?
What kind of company would just allow someone to die for profit?
Her chemo is thirty thousand dollars a month.
No one has that kind of money.
She cannot get a job now because she's sick from chemo.
We're hoping to figure out what to do with her.
It's the last thing someone who is fighting for her life should be dealing with.
Delay, deny, defend.
Medical divorce is actually quite common.
There was a heartbreaking story a few years ago, and this is just one story that gains a lot of traction, but this happens on a daily basis where a a woman was engaged to marry the love of her life.
She has brain cancer.
They had this beautiful wedding ceremony, but they could not get married legally because she doesn't want to pass on medical debt to her husband.
Another netizen writes, my 52 year old mom felt like her cancer was returning and was growing, United Health Care denied a scan my mom needed.
They were delaying it, saying she needed to wait eight more weeks because it hadn't been long enough since her last scan.
At any rate, without a scan, chemotherapy cannot be restarted or any sort of radiation treatment.
We could not afford to pay thousands out of pocket.
My mom was barely working.
Her coworkers donated their own sick hours at work so that she could keep her insurance because if you get fired from your job, you lose your insurance.
We were barely scraping by.
Things were stressful and money was already so tight.
And after some visits and multiple medical issues, the time finally came.
The time United said we could get a scan.
The scans, the cancer had already spread to my mom's brain.
But now it was too late for anything to be done.
We were told that they would have needed to start treatment weeks ago to prevent it from getting to that point.
And there was pretty much nothing that could be done.
Now she was the kindest and person and most caring person.
She cared about everyone she met one day after we bought groceries with most of the funds we currently had left, I was driving home and she rolled down her window and handed a man without a home twenty dollars and gave him a big smile.
Twenty dollars was a lot for us at that time.
She looked at me and said he needed it more than us and that we would be okay.
I smiled and I nodded back.
United robbed us of more time with my mom.
Maybe she wouldn't have lived another year with the scan and chemo when she first noticed returning symptoms.
Or maybe she would have lived a few years.
We don't really know.
But without the scan, without the chemo, without the radiation, they were actively taking coins out of the meter of her life instead of just refusing to feed it.
UnitedHealthCare profits not just by denying claims, but also largely profits by delaying services.
They hold on to their money and save thousands of dollars on my mom and people like her by essentially letting her die more quickly and not having to pay for additional chemotherapy or for radiation, extra doctor's visits and fewer overall hospital visits.
Their criminal enterprise operating under our noses by lining the pockets of lawmakers, forcing smaller health care facilities and independent pharmacies to close, limiting access to health care locations to millions of Americans, especially in smaller towns, denying, delaying life saving services,
all while profiting billions and more every single year.
That CEO died a far too quick and comfortable death in comparison to my mother and people like her who are suffering every day and barely get by financially, physically and mentally while modern day mobsters toy with their lives for profit.
When that shooter story finally comes out, it's going to resonate with many of us.
I've always thought myself a very impartial juror, very open to facts and fair punishment and treatment and playing by the rules.
But I don't think I could, in good conscience, find this person guilty in a court of law.
You may say, who are you to say he should pay with his life?
I would respond with, who are you to say that my mom and innumerable other Americans should have paid with her life and by suffering just to simply line his pockets with a few extra bucks.
I'm an atheist. However, it's days like this that I wish there was a hell because it's people like the United Health Care CEO who deserve to spend an eternity suffering for what they've done to others for their own gain.
He and United Health Care are not out here starving on the streets, stealing a loaf of bread to eat.
They are dragons amassing wealth while raising our cities.
Delay, deny, defend.
And sure, if someone is heartless, they could blame the customers somehow by stating, well, it can't be everyone.
But how is it that pretty much every division that United Health Care touches, other than the shareholders and people making millions off the company, there's at least some people with horrendous life altering experiences, even their own employees.
One alleged United Health Care employee states that when she got a call from a customer, a client technically who's in tears, they were telling her that they were going to die because the medication that they need to live is fifteen hundred dollars a month.
They don't have that and United, the people that they pay to be insured won't cover it.
She says her superiors told her the only appropriate answer for someone like that is to tell them, contact the drug manufacturer and see if they'll give you a manufacturer's coupon.
The same alleged former United employee states that a man had called in once crying, stating that his doctor told him that he needs to get this very specific medication, but it's not covered.
She Googles it, sees that there's a brand name version and a generic version.
United will cover the generic version, not the brand name.
And instead of thousands of dollars a month that he cannot pay, it's going to be twenty, thirty dollars a month.
And United has to cover the rest.
She helps him out, gets it covered through United.
He's so moved, so touched by her generosity of doing the human thing that as a way to show his gratitude, he starts sending flowers to the office to show her managers that she is stellar at her job.
She should get rewarded for it.
She should be promoted.
And it's supposed to be this beautiful story with a beautiful end, right?
She is reprimanded.
Her manager tells her that she should never do that again on the grounds that the insurance rejected the claim for the medication.
She went behind the insurers back to find an alternative.
We said, no, basically, don't go behind our backs and make us pay.
She says, can you imagine paying into insurance and paying into a company that literally is designed to make sure you don't get the care you need and then watching your kids, your parents, your grandparents, your spouse be unalived because you cannot afford these astronomical amounts that are not regulated
at all. That's enough to make a person snap.
I hate to say this, but this is what the employee says.
Former, if you play devilish games, you're going to get devilish prizes.
Another alleged former employee of United says, the call that broke me was a woman calling in about a bill she received.
Her six year old just died from a brain tumor and they were planning the funeral when they got notice that they were being sued by a doctor because United Health Care hadn't paid a nearly one point four million dollar claim.
I couldn't really help her.
Our call center was just for checking if something was in network or covered, but I could see her claim.
One person remarks that the bullet casings having words engraved on them is, quote, that's what we call poetic justice.
For a while, there were speculations that Luigi Mangione had United Health Care and had encountered some of these insurance nightmare stories like everybody else.
But it's been stated that he was never a customer of United.
However, netizens are still putting the dots together.
According to his Goodreads in 2022, Luigi starts reading books about chronic back pain.
The first is cricket, outwitting the back pain industry and getting on the road to recovery and back mechanic by Dr.
Stuart McGill, also Why We Get Sick, the hidden epidemic at the root of most chronic diseases and how to fight it.
His ex -account header is an X -ray photo of someone's back that shows four giant screws in the lower spine, which appears to be from a back surgery that he might have had to treat a condition called spondyloethosis, which is when one of the vertebrae in your spine slips out of position.
It starts putting pressure on the vertebrae below it.
So your spine is made up of 33 stacked bones called the vertebrae.
Your vertebrae are linked together, but they can move depending on how you move, change your posture.
But if you have spondyloethosis, what they call it, one of your vertebrae moves more than it should and slides out of its usual spot.
It's now the real pain happens when that puts pressure or even pinches a nerve in your back.
Can it be, like, repositioned?
Through surgery, which is rough.
Oh, that's why there's the screws to position it.
And once you screw it in place, I mean, you lose a good part of normal mobility.
I mean, I guess it depends per person, but it's pretty rough.
A lot of doctors don't recommend surgery because it's not going to be fun afterwards either.
One doctor states the condition can be very painful if the nerves are pinched.
Putting weight on your spine can hurt a lot.
It's an excruciating type of pain and it doesn't go away with conservative management.
Medications aren't going to help.
Injections aren't going to help.
It can lead to high impact chronic pain.
This is chronic pain that will impact daily acts, schoolwork, daily self care, work.
These people are more likely to struggle with mood with one's ability to get restorative sleep, to manage the distress and anxiety that can naturally occur with pain.
That's going to be disrupted.
You can't even sleep.
Another doctor states for someone with spondy, physical therapy can be excruciating and won't necessarily help.
It's sort of like a torture.
Luigi had briefly done a remote stay in Hawaii as he was remote working.
He was staying in this dorm like structure with a bunch of people that were working remote.
And the landlord of that structure says, when I first interviewed him because they all have to be interviewed, they want everyone to get along.
It's like a co -living situation.
When he moved in, I remember he said he had a back issue and he was hoping to get stronger in Hawaii.
Luigi allegedly told the landlord that he had chronic pain from a pinched nerve from a misaligned spine, spondy.
The landlord states he said his lower vertebrae were almost like a half inch off.
And I think it pinched a nerve.
Sometimes he would be doing well and other times not.
I mean, it was pretty traumatic and difficult that he just took one basic surfing lesson that beginners take.
He was completely bedridden for a week.
Oh, this is just from a little lesson that he took.
No. So he had it already.
And the doctors told him that he could be mobile and he should be mobile.
So he takes one basic surfing lesson and he becomes bedridden for a week.
So it seems that it exacerbated it.
He went on to say that Luigi, quote, he knew that dating and being physically intimate with his back condition was not possible.
I remember him telling me that.
And my heart just breaks.
He said he felt sad for Luigi because Luigi is this young, smart, accomplished, upbeat engineer.
He seems very much into being active fitness.
He loved hiking, surfing, all of these things.
And he can't even do that anymore.
But he does remember that Luigi told him he was going to get spinal surgery in twenty twenty three.
So he texted Luigi.
This is after he moves out of Hawaii.
Luigi just responds.
Long story when asked about how the surgery went.
No more text messages after that, no matter how often he tried to contact Luigi, he would text him, yo, you awake?
Where in the world are you?
Nothing. Radio silence.
Netizens were quick to find a Reddit account called mr underscore cactus that seems to belong to Luigi.
He apparently liked to post about travel gear, Pokemon, go spinal pain.
Everything adds up age, college, what he was interested in.
In one forum about Spondy, Luigi allegedly writes, I first aggravated my Spondy one and a half years ago after surfing, a surfing incident.
My back and hips locked up after that accident.
And my whole lumbar and hips have been out of whack since then.
Something is probably putting pressure on the sacral nerves that innervate the groin and butt area.
He responds. Yeah, it was when I was surfing about a year and a half ago.
Basically, the extension movement destabilized my Spondy.
A few weeks later, I slipped on a piece of paper and my right glute locked and right leg shut down for a week.
Couldn't support any weight on it.
Eventually calmed down, but the stability was compromised and the glute keeps thighs in place, I guess.
He warns other Redditors, if there is anything tight in your hips, maybe check it out with a PT, not to scare you.
But, you know, my numbness has become constant numbness in his body.
Wow. In another comment, he explains how he wants to get surgery because, I mean, likely he's in a lot of pain and cannot even be mobile.
When there's a Redditor talking about how their surgeon won't operate on their back, he comments, keep trying different surgeons.
If your back is broken and it's unlivable, age has nothing to do with it.
Good surgeons understand this and will operate you based on your symptoms and anatomy.
Tell them that you're unable to work.
Do your job. We live in a capitalist society.
I found that the medical industry responds to these key words.
I can't work. It's impacting my ability to work and make a living far more urgently than you describing unbearable pain and how it's impacting your quality of life.
Or plan Z, fake a foot drop or piss yourself.
This is the absolute nuclear option.
But there comes a point where it's just ridiculous that people won't operate on your broken spine.
If this account is really Luigi, he's pretty consistent and positive with uplifting people that are suffering similar symptoms as him while acknowledging how debilitating they are because, again, keep in mind, this is technically an anonymous account.
He never releases his name.
If this is him, he never says, hey, these are my friends.
Please look at my friends.
Nobody knows it's him writing these comments.
And when you see anonymous accounts on the Internet, more likely than not, there are some of the most malicious people alive.
Mm hmm. But he writes to others.
Stop being sedentary when you're an energetic person and used to being so active is one of the worst aspects of this.
But there are still ways to keep your mind and body active while you heal.
I spent a lot of time doing yoga.
Being mindful to avoid certain positions, which was very different for me than my typical routine of weightlifting and martial arts.
But I actually have learned a lot and didn't mind the transition at all.
Basically, there are still options.
Using your body, however, it is currently capable will not only be critical for your mental health, but also helpful in your speedy recovery.
There are also there are always some activities that fall between your normal routine and nothing, even if it initially feels like it's the only option is being sedentary.
Hope that helps. Sorry, you have to go through this.
In another forum about sleep and discipline, it reads, why do I feel like vomiting sensations throughout the day if my sleep the previous night is not good?
Luigi allegedly comments, this has been happening to me since high school.
I'm currently in college.
Any night I would sleep less than six hours, which is a conscious choice, not an unexpected poor sleep.
I would feel nauseous.
Is that unusual? I thought it was normal.
To be honest, this is where it gets very interesting.
A lot of people with chronic back pain have commented that it's not just your physical that declines.
When the pain is so bad, you lose cognitive focus.
Your it's not like you can lay in bed and still have a whole wonderful world in your mind or be be able to be on the Internet and be a part of society in some way.
He comments on a post about brain fog and he writes significant cognitive decline.
Any thoughts? That's what the original poster writes.
Luigi allegedly responds, I have been experiencing symptoms of brain fog since I was 15.
I'm also a very critical, logical thinker like yourself.
My symptoms were very minor at first and I was able to excel in high school.
But the symptoms worsened exponentially last year after my fraternity's very tame Hell Week.
I simply wasn't able to recover from a week of disturbed sleep.
It's absolutely brutal to have such a life halting issue, especially since the issue itself wears down the critical and logical thinking mind you'd usually use to tackle the problem.
The people around you probably won't understand your symptoms.
They certainly didn't for me.
As each test came back negative, the doctors won't have a fucking clue what's going on.
I'm sure you already know most of this.
But basically, I just want to say that you're not alone.
Stay strong. If you ever want to talk, I'm sure there's a lot we can learn from each other's stories.
He further comments that it could have been when he contracted Lyme disease when he was 13 years old.
That's when he started noticing the cognitive decline.
He says after my symptoms severely worsened last year, I underwent several rounds of blood tests.
Two of them included Lyme.
I'm not sure the specific test, but the results were negative.
Do you think this definitely rules out Lyme or is it possible to still have Lyme given negative results?
OK, the brain fog thing.
I see a lot of people making fun of it on the Internet, which I think is crazy.
I know brain fog sounds like a silly little issue.
I've personally dealt with long bouts of brain fog.
You don't even recognize yourself.
You want to pull out your hair.
It impacts even the way that you see yourself, your whole identity, self identity, even it's it was quite unexpected and unusually painful.
He writes working through the brain fog to get my degree has certainly been tougher than anything I ever thought I could handle.
Granted, I went from almost entirely as at a tough school to just passing my classes and not understanding anything, you know, putting in probably twice the amount of work.
There were quite a few times that I considered dropping out, but ultimately I decided that dropping would be much worse.
The days when I don't have any work seems to be the worst.
Struggling to understand lectures and homework is difficult.
But having the same level of difficulty when trying to watch YouTube or read an interesting book is even worse.
I can't even enjoy my free time.
I think it's important to hold on to everything for as long as we can.
Every year I've improved as a person, learning new things, meeting new people, etc.
Last year I seized to tackle anything new and simply held on to what I had built up over the years.
Soon it might be impossible to even pass my classes.
At that point, it seems like the no knowledge lifestyle is the only option.
As you say, I also used excuses for why my grades started tanking.
I used to tell my friends that GPA doesn't matter much for computer science, so I don't care.
By hiding the symptoms, though, I stop myself from getting advice from them, which has definitely turned out to be helpful.
He's saying it's embarrassing, but just tell your friends don't make excuses because they could help you.
He says at the same time, hiding your symptoms only makes it harder for people to believe you once you finally reveal it to them.
Last year was when it all started.
I used to play chess daily against my roommate.
I used it as a metric to see how the brain fog was improving.
Eventually, I just stopped since I could never ever remember any strategy.
He would use the same moves against me day after day.
And I just wouldn't remember them.
So is this like a separate medical issue that he's having or is it related to his spine?
According to his alleged Reddit account, it could be from Lyme disease.
Netizens have argued both.
Those with Lyme say, yeah, that sounds exactly what I'm going through.
But also people with chronic back pain say this is exactly what I'm going through.
And the fact that he could potentially have both could have made it exponentially worse.
And then there's also at the same time, no help.
Or at least it seems like he wasn't even satisfied or something probably went wrong with the surgery.
Right. When he's a long story.
It's not it's not a good story.
No. In another Reddit thread, he admits to having visual snow, which is a neurological condition that a person experiences persistent visual disturbances, it's like seeing static over everything.
Just tiny flickering dots everywhere.
It feels like you're stuck in a snow globe.
Visual snow. It's considered a pretty rare condition.
But one that isn't says the brain fog and visual snow can be symptoms of the back condition he has.
The pain can be so unimaginable that it leads to that.
One that isn't who claims they have the same condition as Luigi.
They write, I would often end my days whimpering on the floor because I couldn't keep going that day.
I almost passed out in an airport bathroom then realized I had been peeing on my shoe.
It's hard to think when you're in that much pain if your brain starts to shut down from the pain, it can affect your vision and give you visual snow.
But it seems like according to the Reddit comments that he's allegedly leaving, he seems optimistic about getting this surgery that he allegedly had in 2023 prior to the surgery.
He comments the doctors, a bunch of them decided no operation is required for me anytime soon, but basically recommended I avoid any and all physical activities outside swimming and physiotherapy bizarre yet common advice from sedentary people who don't live life to the fullest.
In my opinion, if your spine is broken and unstable to the point where you can't run, do you want to be walking around with it?
What are you going to do, wait until you take a bad fall and the instability causes some real nerve damage and you need surgery?
The same account post after getting the alleged spinal fusion surgery in July 2023.
He writes that within days he was able to sit up on his own stand and even walk just fine.
He says, quote, The surgery was not nearly as scary as I made it out to be in my head and I knew it was the right decision within a week.
So it sounds good in that moment.
Initially, but perhaps the surgery did not go as planned because one of his close friends allegedly states the back surgery is what changed everything for him.
He went absolutely crazy.
They said he went off the grid.
He did not talk to his family.
He did not talk to his friends.
Nothing. He was solo traveling.
Some state that he was probably in Japan for a brief moment in time.
Others were trying to his friends were trying to tweet at Luigi saying, are you OK?
You know, what's going on with you?
They say, hey, man, I need you to call me.
I don't know if you're OK or just in a super isolated place and have no service.
But I haven't heard from you in months.
You made commitments to me for my wedding.
And if you can't honor them, I need to know so I can plan accordingly.
October 20 24, another tweet, hey, are you OK?
Nobody has heard from you in months.
And apparently your family is looking for you.
November 26, 2024, thinking of you and prayers every day in your name.
Know that you were missed and loved.
November 27, 2024, they just keep at Luigi his handle.
One of Luigi's friends said that he sent him an X ray of his back after surgery.
And they said it looked heinous.
It just giant screws going down his spine.
And this new information has caused a lot of netizens to relate to Luigi's story.
I feel like everybody knows someone or they themselves have been directly impacted with the torture system that is the health care system in the United States these days, but some netizens don't care.
They say, this is not an excuse.
I had the exact same surgery at 21.
I am now 46 years old.
I live my life in pain and I've had multiple surgeries since.
And you know what I didn't do?
Murder somewhat. To which one netizen responds, do you want a high five for that?
Others point out that we're all on the same side.
Did you not just read what you posted?
They write sounds to me like you've suffered needlessly and terribly at the hands of private insurance companies.
I don't think you should be so self congratulatory about not killing someone over it.
Most people, of course, would not have the goal to throw their life away like that.
But he did. Others comment, chronic pain can send someone off the deep end.
It eats up the brain, the soul.
I mean, really, I have been there.
Another comments, when chronic pain is really bad, even just a week or two with no relief day in, day out, it's hard to even want to be alive.
If his pain was that bad and he was in this state, I would imagine he decided to do something of consequence before he died.
He could have been at the end of his rope, insinuating that he could have made the decision to self exit by this point.
Another writes, my dad has spondy.
And when it first started, he turned into a person I barely recognized.
The pain became so intense, he became bitter and threatening and upset.
I get this. And remember how previously other netizens were saying, well, he is a coward for shooting Brian Thompson in the back.
Some netizens point out that perhaps Luigi wasn't cowardly when he shot Brian Thompson in the back.
They write, maybe it meant something.
Regardless of Luigi's motive, Luigi has started what many netizens feel is a moment for class consciousness.
I personally don't recall the last time so many netizens were united about something that is normally so divisive, which brings into the equation.
What are Luigi's political ideologies?
There have been debates on whether or not Luigi swings left or right, which there seems to be differing opinions or maybe he himself is confused.
He does consistently we post on Twitter famous podcasters and authors who typically have a more right leaning audience.
He also rated JD Vance's Hillbilly Elegy three stars, his book, which is not the worst rating.
But considering he gave the Unabomber four stars, I'd say it's not a great thing.
But he could be conservative and not a fan of the incoming administration.
I don't really know.
It's interesting that some netizens are trying so hard to figure out his political ideologies and see if he is in alignment with their own before deciding how to feel.
I did see some point out just for, I guess, being in depth, pointing out that there are red flags that he's read and rated biographies on Elon Musk, but he's also read the Hunger Games trilogy.
So people are really confused because these two don't align.
Elon Musk, Hunger Games, they're not on the same page.
He's also read The Little Prince.
Some netizens cannot understand his political ideology based off his Goodreads account, believing there to be some green flag, some red flags.
But one netizen comments as an avid reader and librarian, I don't find his reading and ratings of some of these books as a red flag.
I actually think it's really important to read things that are arguing oppositional views to your own.
And some people are kind of losing the plot on this.
One netizen comments that he rated Elon Musk's biography highly.
So he is a red flag.
Luigi is a red flag, to which someone responds, you can still appreciate something without agreeing with it.
You can even give a book.
You disagree with high ratings if it gave you good insight into a new point of view or understanding that you again don't agree with.
Others continue to argue, agree.
But rating Elon Musk's five stars is a real red flag.
He's wacky, to which someone responds.
It was a biography of Musk, not a book written by him.
You can dislike a person and still appreciate an author for a good biography.
But then others point out that he is very much.
Luigi is very much into AI.
So perhaps he is an Elon Musk fan.
But some netizens also point out that he also seems to like Peter Thiel.
And he has tweeted about him in recent years, which netizens don't like.
Peter Thiel is was a co -founder for PayPal.
Interestingly, both Peter Thiel and Elon Musk are from the so -called dubbed PayPal mafia, which Elon Musk was fired from PayPal and replaced by Peter Thiel.
So they're known to have a contentious love -hate relationship.
But they both have very close ties to the incoming administration.
Peter Thiel was allegedly the former mentor to JD Vance, the incoming VP.
So their relationship is seemingly intertwined.
And now people are calling into question, wait, whose side is Luigi on?
But I will say for this case, most netizens don't care.
They don't care where he lies politically, at least not in relation to Luigi.
They think, regardless, this is a moment that we finally have to talk about health care to open this meaningful dialogue.
Do we really need it to be left versus right?
When really what it is is up versus down.
It's who's at the top and who's being denied coverage and dying at the bottom.
That's what it is. They're saying it doesn't matter your political affiliations.
When there are massive health care insurance companies denying your claims, they don't ask you, hey, do you like this person or this party or this politicians or this tech founder who's doing some crazy things?
Like, do you like this person or that person?
They don't care. And they're saying that anyone that's trying to have that conversation is doing a disservice to all those Americans that are getting denied coverage.
Other netizens have taken to just joking about it.
They think the fact that he favorited the bullet journal is kind of funny.
They comment he may have misunderstood what bullet journal means.
Additionally, many netizens really like Luigi based off of his Reddit account.
His other accounts have his name and likeness.
So all of his friends and family, probably the administrators at UPenn, can see his LinkedIn, can see his Twitter, his Instagram, if they really want.
But his Reddit account was more or less anonymous and the way that he speaks comments and interacts with netizens, there is not a single mean comment.
Yeah, you know, you can tell what kind of person he is.
Yeah, they believe he's a decent guy.
He would tell strangers on the Internet, you'll do great.
Whatever you decide.
We can't be afraid to live our own lives to the fullest.
Of course, always feel free to DM me if you have any questions in the future.
Sorry, you're also a member of the shitty back club, but know that you'll be fine, whatever you decide.
Or surgery is scary, but the sooner you get past this, the better.
Good luck with the neurosurgeon consult.
Did you see the Chinese girl?
Yes. Okay. So there was this Chinese post that went viral on Red, which is a Chinese social media app, and she was talking about how her friend was at the same Hawaii dorms that Luigi was in.
And the post has been slightly mistranslated.
It's come on to American social media stating that the girl was talking about how Luigi was so sweet.
Everybody called him sweet.
He was down to earth, very smart, very brilliant and any time he would eat ice cream from the communal freezer, he would replace it.
So that was how it was translated.
And it went viral in America.
And people are saying, that is so sweet because most people won't replace ice cream that they ever ate.
But the truth of the Chinese post is actually much sweeter because the post is her friend had just mentioned in passing, like, I ran out of ice cream and Luigi came with ice cream and it was really well decorated.
He took painters tape because I guess he didn't have ribbon lying around because who has ribbon lying around?
And he used the painters tape to wrap it and do a little painters tape bow at the top.
But some netizens don't agree.
Writing, the guy pops out from behind a car and shoot someone who is defenseless in the back killing him and read it is over here saying, what a kind guy.
I'm not sure kind is the right word to describe a killer who made generic supportive comments on Reddit.
Another comment reads, yeah, he committed cold blooded murder because of his overwhelming kindness, but a lot more people are supporting Luigi, even in the same facility that Luigi is being held in after his arrest.
He's in Pennsylvania as of filming this.
He's fighting the extradition to New York.
If he goes to New York, he's going to be held at Rikers Island.
But the inmates of that same compound, they're screaming out the window towards the reporters, Luigi's conditions suck.
Free Luigi. Which one that is in comment reads, inmates shouting free Luigi and not free us should tell you everything about that man.
But this interview by News Nation is actually quite fascinating.
I've never seen an interview conducted in this manner.
They told inmates because the inmates were watching their show.
So they told them to watch at a certain time.
The inmates have TVs in their cells.
They turn on the news and they can see Ashley, the host, talking.
Then they have another reporter outside the prison and they can see him too.
And he can see the inmates capturing all of this.
And they're screaming out the window, responding to the questions being asked on TV.
They're asked if their dinner was good, yes or no.
And they scream terrible.
It was terrible. That's BS because they release with the inmates each every day and they say, that's not what we're eating.
Oh, like fake food, fake photos.
Yeah, like fake menus.
The inmates later confide that they're getting punished for speaking with journalist.
Yeah, this whole case is becoming more and more thick and crazy.
So while inmates are allegedly getting punished for telling reporters to free Luigi, many security firms have stated that there's a lot of fear.
Corporate leaders are now grappling with one critical question.
How vulnerable are we?
One security firm states companies that adapt quickly and take proactive steps to mitigate risks are not just protecting their executives.
They're safeguarding their futures, such as meta that spends more than twenty four million dollars a year on security for its top executives.
But for the major corporations that don't, they seem very nervous.
Some top corporate security providers have reported a massive influx of calls from potential new clients.
To put it simply, every C -suite executive at any major corporation now wants a body guard, which, of course, netizens think is just dripping in bloody irony.
Other netizens think it's slightly reasonable, considering new wanted posters have popped up here and there in New York City.
Wanted posters for top health care CEOs.
It shows Optum Health CEO, the CEO of United Health Group, Andrew Whitty.
You know, so Brian's bosses bosses and wanted posters with the now late Brian Thompson with a big red X over his face.
The wanted posters read wanted denying medical care for corporate profit.
Health care CEO should not feel safe.
United killed everyday people for the sake of profit.
As a result, Brian Thompson was denied his claim to life.
Who will be denied next?
Deny, defend, depose.
I will say, I guess subjectively, this could be argued as being threatening.
But I've never seen the NYPD so up in arms about something.
The way they talk about these wanted posters is so bizarre, so outraged by these wanted posters, which, again, I guess you could say they're not in good taste, but to be that that in age, so ironic, so ironic.
If you if your ex -boyfriend made a wanted poster with your face, a regular civilian on there, posted them all over New York City, you probably wouldn't even be able to get a restraining order.
The NYPD would be like, well, did he kill you yet?
No. Did he commit a crime yet?
No, freedom of speech.
Moving on next, get out of our precinct.
Isn't that what some people are saying?
Like they couldn't get them like that.
This ex -boyfriend harassing me for years and they wouldn't do anything.
Nothing. And here they are just up in arms about these wanted posters.
So again, I think they're just making the situation worse.
Alongside that are pictures on social media that are circulating of the salaries of the eight biggest health insurance CEOs, along with their names and pictures, which is not illegal.
By the way, these are publicly traded companies.
They are required to release, I think, at least their CEOs and I think like a handful of their top executives along with their salaries.
This is public information.
But NYPD does not like it stating this has the capability to inspire a variety of extremist and grievance driven malicious actors to violence.
It's clear the police are very upset and the netizens have said, matter of fact, let's talk about you two, then the NYPD budget for 2024 is six point three billion dollars of taxpayer money.
They say, what are you doing?
NYPD alone is six point three billion dollar NYPD.
A year, one year saying, wow.
Yeah. And now netizens are saying, what are you doing to solve regular everyday people's murders?
Huh? Do you send scuba divers into the lakes at Central Park because that's our first time seeing that netizens also feel the way NYPD acts like they took a dangerous criminal off the streets before he potentially harmed normal people like you and I is goofy.
The officer that arrested Luigi in Pennsylvania, his name is ironically Officer Fry and Luigi was arrested at McDonald's.
So people think the plot keeps getting thicker.
He says, I can't say I was expecting it by any means, but it feels good to get a guy like that off the street, especially starting my career this way.
Which is Sir Fry just started his career.
That's crazy. Which a lot of people believe highlights again how not in sync out of touch, frankly, they're not saying risk your life and don't arrest people that need to be arrested, I guess.
Right. But they're saying why make this statement?
Say nothing. If you have say nothing, they're saying the police, big corporations, mainstream media are so out of touch with public sentiment.
Again, not saying that if someone is committing a crime, the police should do nothing about it.
Just I mean, there's got to be a better way for him to have said something about it without saying, yay, I might get a promotion so early on in my career.
So great. One netizen comment reads, the NYPD just proved they have the resources to solve any murder by catching Luigi Mangione.
Interestingly enough, they only seem to care to deploy them when the victim is worth $50 million.
But another comments.
This has so much more to do with the embarrassment and scrutiny this brought on to the NYPD than is net worth.
This happened in the open brazenly in Midtown Manhattan.
If NYPD did not catch this guy, they would look really, really stupid.
Small business Saturday just passed and it reminded me of a very interesting fact that you can use at your trivia night next time.
Did you know that small businesses employ half of the nation's workforce?
I didn't know that.
They're really the foundation and backbone of I guess like the whole economy.
And if you've been thinking about launching that hand crochet business that you have dreamed about for years or maybe selling your artwork on a professional scale, you guys always tag me in your artwork.
And I'm like, how are you not like I want to buy this artwork.
You're so talented.
And the time could be now with the new year coming up and Shopify's holiday special make your any size business dreams come true.
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A lot of you guys may know that we've been loving Shopify for some time now.
When we sold Grandpa Mingo's limited edition art prints, Shopify took care of all the nitty gritty tedious stuff.
For example, everything was user friendly, but this was just the chef's kisses and it was the inventory tracker.
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So that allows us and you to focus on sending out more orders and doing all the fun stuff in a business.
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There's this incredible Dior bag that I was really trying hard to find.
I called a bunch of stores.
They told me it was discontinued early 2010.
And I always had heard about ReBag.
It wasn't until I had this fixation on this Dior bag that I was like, you know what?
I'm just going to try it.
I'm going to do it.
ReBag is a luxury resale online platform that specializes in exclusive designer luxury goods.
Investment worthy handbags, Birkins Kelly's vintage Birkins and Kelly's, which I personally think has so much more character and chicness to it.
They have timepieces like Rolex, AP, fine jewelry like Cartier.
Not only does ReBag have the exact bag that I'm looking for, but they actually had a few different color variations that were, again, stop production in 2010.
Did I convince myself that that was a sign that this bag needed to be mine?
Yes, absolutely. But also the experience was just really wonderful.
All of their products from top brands like Louis Vuitton, Chanel, Cartier, Van Cleef and more undergo an in -person, multi -touch review process performed by their in -house team of experts.
They have hundred plus years of combined experience.
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Honestly, ReBag was the only platform where I felt I had a peace of mind as a customer.
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As for how they call it, Luigi, it seems to be just a phone call from a McDonald's employee that some people call a rat, but the NYPD says a combination of old school detective work and new age technology is how we caught Luigi.
The police commissioner continues, we should never underestimate the power of the public to be our eyes and ears.
Now the case will continue through criminal justice process.
And while we are proud of today's accomplishment, we must of course remember that there is a family in mourning.
People say it's just another reminder of class consciousness.
One netizen comments all the effort and resources to apprehend him.
If any of us were murdered, they would have no leads.
There's a video of Eric Adams, the mayor of New York City, who is, I believe, still under investigation for his own corruption.
He's calling Officer Fry from Pennsylvania, the one that arrested Luigi and McDonald's.
Yes. And the mayor tells him, we, as New Yorkers, appreciate it.
You did a great job.
You took a dangerous person off the streets.
You're going to be the most popular police officer in your town.
And netizens said, OK, bet.
And the police have been receiving threats for arresting Luigi.
So I guess popular is subjective.
Another disconnect between mainstream media and most netizens as well.
Some netizens think mainstream media is overdoing the theatrics.
Mainstream media writes that Luigi was a video game assassin.
They write he once belonged to a group of gamers who played assassins in the video game.
You scroll down. What's the video game you ask among us?
This is so dumb. This is so dumb.
Yeah, I don't even know what to say.
The McDonald's, in which he has been arrested and has been flooded with one star reviews, some of them read McDonald's has a very big rap problem, more like NARC Donald's like an arc.
Deny, defend, oppose, diarrhea.
McDonald's. Another comment reads, I should have realized something was wrong when the person who took my order at this McDonald's had weird looking whiskers.
I didn't think much of it because I was hungry, but when I asked for cheese, they got really excited and their ears perked up.
They're all a bunch of rats.
Review rat one humanity zero.
This McDonald's is officially the worst place on Earth.
I walked in for a McChicken.
And what did I get?
A front row seat to a rat olympics floor routine, a little demon sprinted across the dining room like it had unpaid rent.
Frickin rat. Why go here when Taco Bell is just across the way and they know how to keep their mouth shut?
It's just a ronin convention in there.
A lot of people are really upset because technically there is no legal duty to report someone.
If you think you see someone that resembles the guy that the authorities are looking for, you have no legal duty to report them.
I mean, to be fair, you can't hide them in your home and get away with it.
But if you just see something, you don't have to report it.
So they're wondering why did the rat from McDonald's, they say rat from McDonald's, call and report.
Luigi on top of that, they think it's because, oh, the $60 ,000 award.
Well, guess what? The real news is they might not even get it.
They might not even get it.
Why? So they call 911 instead of the tip line.
And usually the government goes through so many hula hoops to try and not give you the reward money.
Oh, OK. Yeah. Delay, deny, defend is what the United States will do, basically, basically.
Yeah. And it's like you have to wait until they're convicted.
There's so many legal little hoops that you have to jump through.
But one comment reads, if they get the money, whoever receives that money, I hope they use it for their health and still end up in debt due to denied claims.
Then you have netizens posting pictures of Luigi and where he was the day of Brian Thompson's shooting.
People have been Photoshopping shirtless Luigi into their pictures, writing what a busy month it's been.
Special thanks to Luigi for his help on December 4th from 6 a .m.
to 6 p .m. What a long shift to never leave our site, not even once to even use the restroom.
Customers really enjoyed your catchphrase, Luigi.
I'll never go to New York City.
And the only thing I hate more than hoods on jackets is guns.
Very weird thing to say constantly all day long to the customers.
But also very funny.
Put on a shirt, you goof.
Yeah. Other netizens think this whole thing is crazy.
Some netizens are still not over the fact that there was a look like contest in Washington Square Park for the shooter writing, Our generation is so unserious, but in a way, aren't we all him?
Imagine he was actually there and didn't win.
Others had very fascinating ideas writing, oh, my God, this is literally what I was LOLing about last night.
What if all the New Yorkers just cosplayed him indefinitely?
The CEOs would be having nervous breakdowns.
Others say during his trial, they will we listen and we don't judge.
Others didn't care for his lookalikes.
They just cared for Luigi's looks, which fair points are made by some netizens.
Objective attractiveness is objective attractiveness, I guess.
They comment he is only guilty of being hot.
Another one reads, Your honor, my client Luigi Mangione is innocent.
He was just demonstrating the true power of having looks that could kill.
The only thing criminal is his bone structure.
Another comment reads, Good luck finding 12 jurors that don't want to fuck him.
Yeah. Others believe that Luigi could be on the stand testifying and they would just hear blah, blah, blah, whatever you say, handsome.
And another comment reads, My only question is, does he have a GoFundMe, which there have been funds popping up here and there.
But I will say I don't think Luigi will be using them.
He does have two attorneys representing him already and they are paid for.
We don't know who's paying them.
Likely his family. I can 100 percent verify this, but it appears he might have been streaming the song Criminal by Britney Spears prior to his arrest.
Really? Which would be not fantastic NYPD, be deplorable NYPD if you are listening to this.
We should actually have a whole press conference about it.
Other netizens point out things they find ironic or funny about this case, which nothing is funny about this case NYPD.
But they write, I think Luigi Mangione rating the Unabomber's Manifesto a four out of five on Goodreads is so funny to me.
It's like, yeah, that was pretty good, but like I could do better.
One slightly unhinged.
But I guess understandable netizen writes currently consulting with an Etsy which to get you out of this, be strong, Luigi.
I just think it's so fascinating that, you know, this is the public reaction.
Right. It's so insightful.
I think it says a lot.
You know, it's a lot to be studied.
Yes, so much to be studied.
And what is to be studied is the health care industry.
So what's very fascinating and truly angering for a lot of people is even with this debate, I will say the people making the memes and editing Luigi, it's definitely a smaller group of slightly more extreme people.
I wouldn't even call them extreme, just funnier people, I guess.
Right. But the generic public is I'm not going to be sad about it.
I'm not going to be sad about Brian Thompson's murder, and we should have these conversations about health care.
Now, mainstream media is just picking from these memes, posting them on their little TV channels and saying things like, you know, the system is broken, we can all agree on that.
But murder is wrong.
And they're so focused on the reaction of netizens that all they have to say about health care is the system is broken and we can all agree on that.
Why don't you talk about how the system is broken?
Why don't you talk about anything else?
It's so goofy. No one believes you if you say stuff like that.
Other netizens are just shocked and left rethinking their standing on this.
They comment, OK, the CEO assassin is actually finer than I thought.
Like they could never make me hate him.
So what now? Luigi has been charged with forgery, carrying a gun without a license, false identification to law enforcement authorities and with tampering in Pennsylvania, prosecutors have filed murder charges as well as other charges against him in Manhattan.
He is fighting his extradition to New York City.
Side note, there were a series of released mug shots of Luigi.
One of them appears that he has urinated on himself.
And some people were making fun of him saying like, there's no way he's the CEO assassin when he peed himself when he got arrested.
He's baby. But a lot of netizens who have dealt with chronic back pain and spondy and spinal fusion surgery, they say that for about two years, you cannot hold in your pee.
And it's actually a really big part of chronic back pain that nobody talks about, because as an adult, you're expected to do certain things and it really does break your own identity.
And it's it is humiliating.
When you feel like you have to pee, you can no longer hold it like any other adult.
You have to use the restroom right now.
You cannot hold your urine.
And they believe that the police would not let him use the restroom and he peed himself and some netizens were actually pointing out police have allegedly done this before, where if they really don't like a suspect, they'll try to get you to beg for things they want to humiliate you.
So they might have tried to get Luigi to beg them to use the restroom and he might have decided he'd rather urinate himself.
And I think it was you that pointed this out because we were talking about it over at dinner and you're saying he does hold his chin up high in that specific photo.
So it might be like you can tell his energy.
I'm not going to beg and I'm not going to.
So again, we could be speculating and we could be wrong.
But something to note during Luigi's first court appearance, it's been reported that, quote, prosecutors tried to highlight the $10 ,000, the $8 ,000 in USD, the $2 ,000 in foreign currency that was found on him.
Also, they said that he had a Faraday bag, which blocks electric signals, electronic signals.
The prosecutor suggests criminal sophistication with what was found on his body.
Apparently, Luigi added during his first court hearing.
This is when he didn't have an attorney.
He said, I'd like to correct two things.
First, I don't know where any of that money came from.
I'm not sure if it was planted.
And also that bag is waterproof.
So I don't know about criminal sophistication.
Then during his next hearing, he's heard yelling while the cops slam him up against the wall.
This is completely unjust and an insult to the intelligence of the American people and their lived experience, which has opened the door to more conversations about the mainstream media coverage versus social media coverage.
Mainstream media reports this as a violent outburst.
They're almost framing him as this maniac.
Some netizens have even stated people are making jokes about this, but be prepared for the media to hand select photos that make him look as deranged as possible, which they've already started doing.
They have started using a screenshot of him screaming where it looks like he's almost snarling at people.
Mainstream media also has reported that, quote, thanks to the hero McDonald's worker, that a dangerous criminal is behind bars.
Yeah. And they say this is the same mainstream media that believe McDonald's workers don't deserve a living wage.
Suddenly, they're heroes to them.
Another mainstream media host actually wished Luigi to die in prison on a very controversial news channel, yeah, wanted him to die in prison.
He has been denied bond at his arraignment and his family, Luigi's family, has made a statement saying, unfortunately, we cannot comment on news reports regarding Luigi Mangione.
We only know what we have read in the media.
Our family is shocked and devastated by Luigi's arrest.
We offer our prayers to the family of Brian Thompson and we ask people to pray for all involved.
We are devastated by this news.
In Pennsylvania, Luigi is represented by Tom Dickey, one of the few attorneys in Pennsylvania that's qualified to do death penalty cases.
Not that this is a death penalty case as of right now.
It wouldn't even be in Pennsylvania.
But just to show he's a very qualified attorney when asked if the so -called manifesto is enough evidence for the police, Luigi's attorney states, I know you can't tell, but I'm five six, but I could write on a piece of paper that I'm six five and all other kinds of stuff.
Yeah. So he's saying you can write whatever you want on a piece of paper.
How is that evidence?
Yeah. So a lot of people really like his attorney because the way he's just so blunt, for lack of a better words.
Yeah. And he seems like he's having a good time with the media.
As for evidence, he says he has seen no evidence against his client.
He holds up both of his hands like he's trying to catch a ball.
And he says, look, zoom in.
This is all the evidence I've seen.
Zoom in zoom in, everyone.
Nothing, nothing. Nada.
He also admits when asked that, yes, according to a staff, people are reaching out to him helping trying to offer to help to pay Luigi's legal bills.
CNN straight up asks him, why do you think people are offering to help pay his legal fees?
He responds, the Supreme Court says all these rich billionaires can give all kinds of money to candidates, and that's free speech.
So maybe these people are just exercising their right to free speech and saying that's the way they're supporting my client.
Which kind of shuts CNN up pretty quickly.
So that's his attorney in Pennsylvania.
Recently, he just retained another attorney in New York who, interesting, has a connection to another case that we've been working on.
She is the wife of Mr.
Agna, his first name, Mark, I believe, Mark Agna Philo.
He's representing Diddy.
And she's going to be representing Luigi Mangione.
She is actually very well established.
She's the legal counsel for the law and order show.
She's the consultant to make sure that everything makes sense in the legal world.
She's done a lot of good work and she will be representing Luigi now.
High profile attorney, very well connected, which is usually helpful.
Now, Luigi's friends have come out of the woodworks to talk about him.
Obviously, many people are speaking about his back surgery and the potential debilitating chronic pain he suffered from.
But some people, most of them are just talking about how nice he is.
I haven't seen a single weird thing about Luigi yet.
Nothing. And they're all just surprised.
They say even when we had conversations about capitalism and all these things, Luigi never seemed like someone who had an axe to grind.
He was always very calm and chill.
He's the leader of a lot of clubs, to which someone comments in the club.
We're all crying for Luigi.
But one that is in comments, it's truly a testament to his character that even after becoming a suspect, to a high profile murder case, everyone that he knows and has interacted with has has nothing but good things to say about him.
And the crazy thing is, if you watch these interviews of mainstream media interviewing his friends, they're trying to trip the friends up, like asking, like, are you sure he didn't say anything crazy?
Are you sure he never acted a certain way?
All of them are so steadfast.
Like, no, he was like the sweetest guy ever.
And then within three minutes they end the segment because I guess it's not entertaining.
They're not getting what they want, which is someone to hate Luigi.
So I will leave you with the last remaining public sentiments I could find.
Some people think that Luigi is evil, especially now that he has been arrested.
His Goodreads account has been revealed and all of these other things.
And they write, great, big round of applause for the law enforcement personnel who resolved this so quickly.
Anyone who elevates this man as a hero is ignorant.
Imagine a world where supposed vigilantes are heroes.
You would be the next victim.
Most netizens comment.
Sorry, I don't make enough to be the next victim.
Or simply, why would I be the next victim?
I'm not killing people by denying them insurance that they paid for.
Another netizen states those hailing him as a hero must confront the chilling reality he took the life of an unarmed human being in cold blood with the victims back turned a deliberate and cowardly act.
Other netizens are more focused on the potential hypocrisy of the incident, writing, you hate capitalism, yet you come from a wealthy family.
Another person comments, nobody cares.
He wasn't trying to stop World War III.
He pulled a trigger, premeditated on a man for financial reasons.
We shouldn't give him a platform.
There is no rightful advocating for violence.
Fuck him. Another writes he is no hero and he is not God and he doesn't get to decide who gets to live, to which someone comments neither can insurance companies heart.
They comment back and that's your justification for murder.
What the fuck is wrong with you?
What this man did was very sad and he literally just ruined his whole life.
OK, he could have used his privilege to help so many other people, but he was at the end of his rope.
Or it's turned into a conversation about woman loving criminals, which, to be fair, I think there is a genuine case of it being alarming and hazardous to society, more so when people believe that they can change full blown, sadistic serial killers or think that a criminal is less guilty because he has badly
done face tattoos. Yes, I do think it's alarming.
However, I don't know if this is the most fitting case for that sentiment, but a bunch of men have taken upon themselves to say things like, oh, woman loves saying I hate men because they're dangerous, but I love Luigi Mangione writing Luigi Mangione has showed us the dark nature of females once again,
which is such an odd take when there is meaningful conversations to be had, but go off, Tiny King.
They also write these people, they need years of therapy to which a lot of girly pops have responded in the comments.
I mean, yeah, but they won't cover it.
So here we are. One Reddit post has been getting a lot of traction this week.
The title is I'm disgusted to see how many people in America are OK with murder.
And the body reads, I'm sorry, but I will never be OK with the killing of 60 ,000 Americans per year due to being uninsured or underinsured and not seeking medical care because of it.
I will never be OK with American citizens committing self exit due to being unable to pay medical bills.
I will never be OK with the insurance industry in the US denying health insurance to sick and injured people because they want to maximize profits.
Murder is wrong. That is all to which the top common is murder is wrong.
But if done through a corporation on a massive scale using tons of paperwork, well, then it's just a business, isn't it?
But the general sentiment being none of this has anything to do with Luigi or Brian Thompson.
They write, I will be praying for the families of those who are denied services and suffered financial disaster and those who lost loved ones because of needed services being denied.
It's not about how attractive Luigi Mangione is.
It's not about how awful the murder of Brian Thompson is.
This is the true discourse we should be having to which one that is in hesitantly responds.
Unfortunately, I don't think this guy is going to survive prison.
I'm sure the elites want this guy permanently done.
Others are considering nicknames for Luigi Mangione, Robin Hood, The Riddler, The Claims Adjuster, but some argue the defendant, murderer, killer.
I guess the more fitting nickname depends on who you ask.
And that is the current ongoing case of Luigi Mangione and the murder of Brian Thompson, the CEO of United Health Care, which, again, Luigi is innocent until proven guilty just like anybody else in the system.
But what are your thoughts on this case?
Let me know in the comments and please stay safe.
