Luigi Mangione's Friends React to His Arrest — One Called Him "The Nicest Person"

When 26-year-old Luigi Mangione was taken into police custody on Dec. 9, 2024, as the prime suspect in the shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, people breathed a sigh of relief. Justice for the murder of a husband and father now seemed within reach. Luigi has been charged not only with murder but also with one count of forgery and criminal possession of a firearm, according to CNN.

Despite the image being painted of Luigi, his friends' reactions to his alleged criminal acts and arrest suggest that the person described by the media doesn’t quite fit the person they know. Here’s how Luigi’s friends and acquaintances are describing him and why they are baffled by the string of events that have recently unfolded.

A number of people have been speaking out after Luigi was arrested and subsequently charged with murder, with his friend Tracy Moel being one of them. In a TikTok quickly gaining traction on the platform, Tracy shared a video of the two having a fun night out in search of some mochi.

She started her caption by acknowledging that Luigi has become a widely searched term, writing, "Luigi Mangione is probably the most Google keyword today. But before all of this, for a while, it was also the only name whose Facetime calls I would pick up."

She then proceeds to describe the type of person Luigi is, saying, "He was one of my absolute best, closest, most trusted friends. He was also the only person who, at 1 a.m. on a work day, in this video, agreed to go to the store with drunk me, to look for mochi ice cream." Clearly, Tracy, like most people, is trying to piece together how someone who can be your best friend one day could turn into an alleged killer the next.

While Tracy might have seen a different side of Luigi than the one the media is portraying, her video garnered some unusual commentary, with people expressing their love and support for him, saying they're praying for his safe release. Others had to chime in and remind users that Luigi is being accused of murder.

When Luigi's friend R.J. Martin interviewed potential tenants for Surfbreak, his co-living community on the 40th floor of a high-rise in Honolulu, he said one of his criteria was finding people who "are looking to give back" and "leave things better than we found them." Luigi "fit the bill" and was "an ideal member for us," Martin said in a statement, per The New York Times.

While Martin acknowledged that Luigi suffered from "debilitating" back pain during his time living in Honolulu and underwent surgery, his overall reaction to the arrest suggests he didn’t see Luigi as a cold-blooded killer. Martin also admitted that he "can make zero sense of it," calling the alleged crime Luigi committed "unimaginable," per WDSU News 6.

A schoolmate of Luigi's, Freddie Leatherbury, who graduated with him at Gilman School, described him as "one of the nicest, most friendly kids" in a statement to WBAL 11 News. Freddie said, “I can tell you that this is one of the last people you think would do something like this.”

He went on to explain that Luigi didn’t fit the profile of someone accused of such crimes, noting, "There was nothing that came off weird about him. He had great friends. He had a lot of female friends as well." Freddie described Luigi as "down to earth" and "well-adjusted socially," emphasizing that he couldn’t fathom him committing such an act.

In cases like this, where someone unexpectedly commits murder (allegedly, in this instance), there are often warning signs, as seen in the case of Nikolas Cruz. However, it seems that none of the people who befriended Luigi or knew him observed any suspicious behavior before he went M.I.A. in the summer of 2024.