By Avery Hill
Triangle Staff Writer
The growing idea that individuals should take matters of justice into their own hands is a concerning trend where Americans seem set on elevating individuals whose morality has taken a backseat to their own personal sense of justice.
Vigilante justice in reality is not a true representation of justice as it skips vital nuances and complications that the legal system has been specially designed to address. In the United States we have a comprehensive legal system set with due process, the ability to appeal and a right to have legal representation.
Some Americans seem to have taken on this unwarranted affiliation to Robinhood-type figures in public life without acknowledging that in the 21st century we do not face the same struggles against rampant corruption and power imbalance that medieval England did during the days of the Robinhood legend.
Early during the morning of Dec. 4 last year in New York City, United HealthCare CEO Brian Thompson was fatally shot. CCTV footage showed that Luigi Mangione allegedly gunned down the 50-year-old Thompson with shots to his back and right calf as he walked out of his midtown Manhattan hotel. The words “delay,” “defend” and “depose” were found etched into casings and live rounds discovered at the scene.
Five days later, authorities arrested the 26-year-old Mangione in an Altoona, Pa., McDonald’s after a worker identified him and alerted police of his whereabouts. Mangione was found with a 9-millimeter pistol and a suppressor, consistent with the weapons used in the killing of the health-care executive.
Independent journalist Ken Klippenstein released Mangione’s three-page manifesto on his Substack; the validity of the document was confirmed by law enforcement.
“Frankly, these parasites simply had it coming,” Mangione wrote. “A reminder: the U.S. has the No. 1 most expensive healthcare system in the world, yet we rank roughly No. 42 in life expectancy.”
Mangione now faces more than 20 criminal counts in Pennsylvania, New York and federal court. The Ivy League-educated data engineer from a wealthy Baltimore family faces a bevy of serious charges, included stalking, illegal gun possession and first-degree murder.
The response to Mangione from the overall public has been one in which there’s surprising support. Whether it is his defense fund now getting close to $1 million, or the “internet boyfriend” title given to him by TikTok, Mangione has had no lack of backing, especially from younger adults.
In America, you are innocent until proven guilty. Mangione is no different. He has been charged with murdering Thompson in the streets of New York, but we should presume his innocence until a court led by a judge and jury of his peers either convicts or acquits him of these charges.
In the meantime, we should have a modicum of sympathy for this family man from modest means educated at a public state university (Iowa) who was murdered in cold blood. It is clear that our healthcare system in the U.S. has fallen short. Many who are under our privately dominated system face coverage challenges on a daily basis. But the sentiment of praising individuals for taking the life of a man over policy disagreements reveals a concerning reality that we as Americans will have to come to terms with.
Perhaps in the grand scheme of life, Brian Thompson was not an innocent man. United HealthCare denied a record-setting amount of claims under Thompson’s tutelage. But that does not give credence to vigilante justice and individuals skirting the boundaries of the law to make a greater political point.
In the end, Thompson represented more than just an avatar for a broken healthcare system—he was a father and a husband. Thompson did not solely “break” our healthcare system, and he could not have been solely expected to fix it.
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