The man accused of killing UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson is confined to a cell by himself in a Pennsylvania prison and has taken every meal there, an official told Newsweek.
Luigi Mangione, 26, is being held without bail at the maximum security State Correctional Institution Huntingdon in Pennsylvania following his arrest in a McDonald's in Altoona on Monday.
That came five days after Thompson, 50, was gunned down as he walked alone to his company's annual investor conference at the New York Hilton Midtown in New York City on the morning of December 4.
Mangione's lawyer Thomas Dickey has said his client will plead not guilty to gun and forgery offenses in Pennsylvania.
He is fighting attempts to extradite him to New York, where prosecutors have filed second-degree murder and other charges in connection with Thompson's killing. A hearing has been scheduled for December 30.
Dickey has also said he has yet to see evidence decisively linking his client to the crime and urged people not to "rush to judgement in this case."
Inmates at the prison defended Mangione during a live broadcast on NewsNation on Wednesday, and said that his conditions "suck."
What is Luigi Mangione's cell like?
Mangione is being held on his own in a small cell, but is not in solitary confinement, Maria Bivens, a spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections, told Newsweek on Friday.
The cell is just 15 feet by six feet with walls made of concrete, and is equipped with a bed, sink, toilet and a desk with a seat, according to Bivens.
Mangione "can look out the front of his cell where there is a window which provides natural light," she said.
Mangione is "not interacting with other inmates at this time" and "has taken every meal in his cell," she said. Meals are served three times a day, at 6:15 a.m., 10:40 a.m., and 5:15 p.m.
The prison's menu including fruit, grits, scrambled eggs and "porcupine meatballs"—a dish made from ground beef and rice—for lunch, according to NewsNation.
Mangione does not currently have access to a television, Bivens said, but inmates can purchase a personal television if they wish.
He will eventually be allowed to have time outside of his cell, Bivens said. "All inmates are afforded time outside of their cells, even if they are a higher custody level," she said.
Police said Mangione was found with a "ghost gun" matching shell casing found at the scene of the shooting. They also said they matched Mangione's fingerprints to a water bottle and protein bar wrapper found near the scene.
Mangione, an Ivy League graduate from a prominent Maryland real estate family, wrote about experiencing severe chronic back pain before undergoing a spinal fusion surgery in 2023 in posts on social media.
Afterwards, his posts suggested the operation had changed his life for the better and he urged others to consider the same type of surgery.
Joseph Kenny, the NYPD's Chief of Detectives, said on Thursday that Mangione's family reported him missing to San Francisco police in November.
Kenny also said in an interview with NBC New York that Mangione did not appear to have ever been insured by UnitedHealthcare, but that investigators are looking at whether he may have been motivated by anger toward the health-care industry.
UnitedHealth Group, UnitedHealthcare's parent company, confirmed to Newsweek on Thursday night that it did not provide health insurance for Mangione.
Investigators are looking into an accident that injured Mangione's back and sent him to an emergency room in July last year, Kenny said in the interview, and studying his writings about his disdain for the U.S. health-care system.
"We have no indication that he was ever a client of United Healthcare, but he does make mention that it is the fifth largest corporation in America, which would make it the largest health-care organization in America," Kenny said. "So that's possibly why he targeted that company."
Kenny added: "It seems that he had an accident that caused him to go to the emergency room back in July of 2023, and that it was a life-changing injury.
"He posted X-rays of screws being inserted into his spine. So the injury that he suffered was a life-changing, life-altering injury, and that's what may have put him on this path."
A handwritten note that was found after Mangione was detained on Monday referred to "parasites" that "had it coming."
The note said the U.S. has the most expensive healthcare system in the world and the profits of large corporations continue to rise while "our life expectancy" does not.
The note condemned corporations that "continue to abuse our country for immense profit because the American public has allowed them to get away with it."
It added: "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."
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About the writer
Khaleda Rahman is Newsweek's National Correspondent based in London, UK. Her focus is reporting on education and national news. Khaleda ... Read more