Prosecutors in New York charged Luigi Mangione, 26, with the murder of medical insurance firm UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson on Tuesday.
Mangione was arrested on Monday following the murder of Thompson, who was shot outside a Midtown Manhattan hotel on Wednesday, December 4.
The suspect fled the scene and rode a bike to Central Park before ordering a taxi to a bus station that offers trips to several nearby states.
Police received several tip-offs from McDonald’s employees at a branch around 375 kilometers away in Altoona, Pennsylvania, leading to the arrest of Mangione, AP reported.
Following the arrest, police found a 3D-printed pistol with a loaded glock magazine and a black silencer attachment, also 3D-printed, in Mangione’s backpack, said CNN, quoting the criminal complaint document.
Since Thompson’s killing, hundreds of US citizens have flooded social media with stories saying UnitedHealthcare had denied them medication for unclear reasons, CNN reported.
According to the nonprofit health policy research group “Kaiser Family Foundation,” (KFF) around 58% of insured adults have had at least one problem in a year, according to a survey released in June 2023.
“Limitations on access to care due to claims denials have been a source of frustration for a long time,” Kaye Pestaina, KFF’s director of patient and consumer protections program, said.
Authorities have recovered shell casings at the crime scene with the words “depose” and “delay” etched into them, police told reporters. In addition to a fake ID, NYPD officers also recovered a handwritten document that NYPD Chief of Detectives, Joseph Kenny, described as the suspect’s “manifesto.”
One line from the document reads, “these parasites had it coming.” Another reads, “I do apologize for any strife and trauma, but it had to be done.” Kenny suggests that the suspect likely acted alone, and was self-funded.