🔗 Share this article Luigi: The Making and the Meaning by John H Richardson – Sympathy for a Devil? On the fifth of December 2024, a leading publication ran the headline “Insurance CEO Gunned Down In Manhattan”. The article then noted that Brian Thompson was “shot in the back in Midtown Manhattan by a assailant who then walked coolly away”. The daytime killing was truly cold and shocking. But many Americans had a different response: for those who had been denied health insurance or struggled with medical bills, the news felt cathartic. Social media blew up. One comment read: “All jokes aside … no one here is the judge of who should live or perish. That’s the job of the artificial intelligence system the insurance company designed to maximize profits on your health.” Less than a week after, Luigi Mangione, a handsome, 26-year-old University of Pennsylvania alumnus with a graduate degree in computing, was apprehended at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania. He awaits trial on federal and state charges of murder, with the district attorney seeking the death penalty. So who is Mangione? And what might have motivated the alleged crime? These are the questions John H Richardson seeks to resolve in an investigation that explores broader themes, too. Understanding the Person A journalist for Esquire magazine, Richardson spent years researching the communities that exist in the hidden parts of the internet, producing articles about people “plagued by genuine concerns about an end-times scenario”. To uncover “the making” of his subject, Richardson first examines Mangione’s extensive reading. We learn that “[when] he was arrested, Luigi had a list of 295 books on Goodreads”. Their subject matter covered climate change to masculinity, along with a “focus on his own self-improvement, both physical and mental”. Additionally, Richardson analyzes his correspondence with online personalities and authors as well as his many updates on social media. These original materials, intended to depict a picture of Mangione, instead present him as an unclear character. Richardson attempts to explain this by proposing that “Luigi’s mystery, in fact, is what gives him a little of that old trickster magic”. Throughout the book, Richardson attempts to cast his subject in symbolic roles. Mangione is profoundly worried about the world around him, one where ‘change is rapid whether we like it or not’ The Meaning Behind the Crime As for “the meaning” of the title, Richardson uses as a clue three words – “postpone”, “deny” and “remove”, engraved on the ammunition left behind at the crime scene. These are the terms sometimes used by medical insurers to reject claims. He examines the indication Mangione suffered from a long-term spinal issue, which might have provided motive for an attack, but finds no proof; instead, what significance there is seems to lie in Mangione’s philosophical dread about the world around him, one where “everything is accelerating whether we like it or not, moving rapidly to the edge”; a world where the general belief seems to be that AI is going to ultimately either take control, or eliminate humanity, or both. Missing Pieces Notably missing from the book are interviews with the key individuals. Richardson asked, of course, but never expected access to Mangione himself. And his relatives stated explicitly that they had decided against speaking to the media in advance of the trial. Another glaring gap is any significant information about the victim, Thompson, though we learn that under his leadership, from 2021 to 2023, UHC profits rose significantly. Ambiguous Findings By book’s end, the audience has little insight of Mangione’s personality or what could have driven his alleged crimes. More troubling, Richardson’s obvious sympathy for him gives the reader the uncomfortable impression of having been exposed to a veiled endorsement of an targeted killing. In the book’s closing remarks, Richardson delivers his fairytale assessment: “We’ve entered a era of stories, the insane ruler, the monster in the maze and the naked leader.” In that tale “Robin Hoods come with a appealing vow … They arrive in times of social turmoil, when the population is in pain and everything is confusing anymore.” One thing is certain: as Mangione’s legal representatives continues in its attempts have accusations that could lead to the death penalty dismissed, any reference of myths, folk heroes, champions or villains will not be admissible as evidence in defence of this handsome young man with a “features reminiscent of classical art” soon to be on trial for murder.