Luigi Mangione Was Involved With Two College Fraternities and Started a Video Game Club
"Passion is what we’re looking for."
Published Dec. 13 2024, 6:07 p.m. ET
Once a person of interest was arrested in connection to the death of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, all of social media stood to attention. Only five days passed between Thompson's murder and the arrest of a suspect and in that time, the online world reacted with glee and horror over what happened. Some people condemned the actions of the gunman while others shared heartbreaking stories of UnitedHealthcare denying insurance claims, which often led to death.
Once the alleged shooter's identity was revealed, things took a wild turn. Luigi Mangione was suddenly the subject of countless thirst traps as shirtless pics circulated online. His own social media accounts were located and dissected, as information about who he was became public knowledge based on old posts.
For example, we know he had some sort of back injury and was active on Tinder at some point. We also know Mangione was in at least one fraternity while in college. Details to follow.
Luigi Mangione was a member of an academic fraternity and, well, a regular fraternity.
According to The Daily Pennsylvanian, Mangione was inducted into the University of Pennsylvania's Eta Kappa Nu honor society for excellence in electrical and computer engineering in 2018. This is more of an academic honor society, versus a classic fraternity, which only invites the "top quarter of the junior class and top third of the senior class in those two majors for membership."
When asked by the outlet to comment, the current president as well as Mangione's peers did not respond.
As an undergrad student at Penn, Mangione was also a member of the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity, reported The Daily Pennsylvanian. Members of the press descended upon the house the day Mangione was arrested, but no one spoke to them. Meta deactivated Mangione's Instagram account, but screenshots of some of his posts have been posted on other platforms.
One user on X uploaded a picture of Mangione with his Phi Kappa Psi fraternity brothers in front of their house. Mangione is holding a firecracker in his mouth. The caption below reads, "WARNING: EMITS SHOWERS OF SPARKS. DO NOT PUT IN MOUTH. LIGHT FUSE AND GET AWAY. - the live firework in my mouth."
Luigi Mangione founded a game development club at the University of Pennsylvania.
In 2016, Mangione founded UPGRADE, a video game development club that "strives to foster creative expression and cultivate career skills for the artists, programmers, and creatives interested in game development in the Penn community," per their website.
After Mangione was taken into custody, Penn scrubbed an interview they did with him about the club. We were able to locate it using the Wayback Machine.
Mangioine told the interviewer that in high school he "started playing a lot of independent games and stuff like that, but I wanted to make my own game, and so I learned how to code." He then spent his freshman and sophomore years of high school learning how to program, which is why he chose to study computer science in college.
"I just really wanted to make games," he said.
The idea for UPGRADE began with a Facebook in the summer of 2016. Mangione popped into the Penn Class of 2020 Facebook group and asked if anyone was interested in developing games. Fellow student Josh Nadel said yes and the two of them met up to brainstorm ideas, along with 40 other people.
When he was interviewed, the program was in its second year and continued to grow. He stressed that it wasn't just for computer science majors or other programmers. Building a video game requires people with all sorts of backgrounds such as artists, musicians, and writers.
"Our mentality is if anyone is interested in and passionate about game development and wants to put in the time, we’re happy to help them," he said. "Passion is what we’re looking for."