After the UnitedHealthcare chief
executive “was gunned down by a masked man outside a Manhattan hotel” in New
York City, “a days-long manhunt” occurred that “spanned several states.”[1]
The fact that only a few days were needed to find the suspect, Luigi Mangione,
indicates just how massive and public the manhunt was. For it was not just any
murder, as if the murder of a person who is the chief executive of a large
corporation were worth so much more than that of the rest of us. I suspect that
the influence of the company, and, moreover, corporate America, on local police
in any U.S. member state is more than reaches the headlines. The case at hand
my even suggest that that influence includes even tacit instructions to treat anti-corporate
suspects of murder violently both in retaliation and as a visible reminder to
other potential killers that CEOs are off-limits.
As Pennsylvania sheriff employees
took Mangione from a vehicle to the back door of a courthouse, at least two of
the employees shoved the suspect—and, remember, in the U.S. a suspect is
presumed innocent unless or until proven guilty in a court of law—into a wall
even though the wall was not on the way from the vehicle to the back door. In
other words, the unnecessary violence was not on the way to the back door, and
nor was the suspect resisting going into the courthouse. I contend that the
unnecessary violence was at the behest of the corporation whose CEO the suspect
allegedly shot. At that time, the evidence that would be found had not
yet been found, as per the defense attorney’s statement in the courthouse. Whether
the violence being maliciously applied by sheriff employees was merely to show
the world how a suspect accused of killing a CEO gets treated by law
enforcement, or to stop the suspect from speaking to the media present on
his way to the backdoor is not clear. It seems to be possible, at the very least, that corporate
instructions given to the police in Pennsylvania included: Don’t let the guy
get his anti-corporate message out. This would be ironic, given that corporations had at the time the right of free speech, even through spending as if money constitutes speech.
That Mangione was not resisting
going into the courthouse and yet was manhandled rougher than suspects were
typically treated at the time may give Americans, as well as the world, a
glimpse into the power that large concentrations of private wealth (which is
what a corporation is) even as translated into raw violence. The use of
police by companies in twentieth-century America to beat workers on
strike is well documented. What I am suggesting is that local police were still
susceptible to wealthy private interests such as corporations into the next
century, at least as of the 2020s. I contend that any contact between
police departments and the healthcare insurance company would properly have
been limited to the police gaining information in the search for the killer.
Another indication of an
over-reaction by local police occurred days after Mangione had been arrested,
when Briana Boston was charged with a felony “with one count of making threats
to conduct a mass shooting” during a phone call with Blue Cross Blue Shield,
her health-insurance company, which was denying a claim that she had submitted.
Obviously angry, she said, “Delay, deny, depose. You people are next.”[2]
The phrase, “delay, deny, depose,” had been written on bullets by Mangione in
reference to tactics that insurers use to avoid paying out claims and had
become popular online. Because of the popularity, it could not be assumed that the
woman was planning on writing the three words on bullets; the phrase had
entered the lexicon. In fact, “(a)ccording to a consumer survey by KFF, more
than half of insured [American] adults [had] experienced problems with their
insurance provider, and some [of those adults] reported serious consequences.”[3]
Strangely, the local police in Lakeland, Florida, said that her statement could
be taken as probable cause of “making a threat to conduct a mass shooting . . .,
according to the affidavit.”[4]
A reasonable interpretation of, “you guys are next,” is that if Blue Cross
continues to screw policy holders who do their part in paying premiums, someone
may eventually go too far in retaliation. She did not say that she was
going to take any violent action, or what that action might be. Given that she
was momentarily angry, and perhaps justifiably so, the police employee who
leapt to the conclusion that the woman was saying she would conduct a mass
killing is ludicrous, and yet the police had the discretion (and thus power) to
make an example of the woman by charging her with a crime carrying a
fourteen-year sentence, without her having done anything. Had being angry at
customer-service employees become a crime? Or, had free-speech that is objectionable
to big business become a crime? If so, could corporations next go after certain
thoughts, using employees of local police departments who dismiss
protecting the public as dutiful sycophants?
We can turn the Lakeland police investigation
on its head by investigating that department. It is significant that “Lakeland,
Florida police said they were contact by the FBI . . . in response to the
alleged threat.”[5]
That the police did not waste any time and did not seem to second-guess the FBI
may suggest that the FBI had been determined to snuff out the “potential” copy-cat.
To be sure, the FBI may simply have been over-cautious, but even that could
have been due to pressure from Blue Cross or elected officials who have
received campaign contributions from the giant company. That both the FBI
and the local police department in Florida would knowingly seek to charge an
angry policy holder of a crime that carries a sentence of 14 years in prison
indicates a grossly disproportionate reaction, which itself could point
back to the deference that the FBI (and local police) give to business in doing
its bidding, even to scare the public.
As an anecdote, once when leaving
a restaurant after barely eating a very badly cooked meal, I was speaking to
people in the shopping center’s parking lot about the food. The manager
of the restaurant got wind of this and approached me even though I was no
longer on her establishment’s property. “The police here are my friends!” she
warned me. “Keep talking about my restaurant and I will get them to make you
leave.” The manager’s sheer presumptuousness was laughable, so I kept talking
as was my right. She did call her friends, who told me I had to leave the
parking lot even though that lot was not owned by the restaurant. That the
police dismissed my legitimate objection told me enough; I moved to another
suburb of Phoenix only months later; Mormon-run Mesa was simply too corrupt
(and drug-ridden).
If my small window into the deference
that local police pay to small business in falsely enforcing law that is not
really law is correct, it is not difficult to conjecture that the FBI as well
as local police may be unduly biased towards, perhaps even de facto working
for, large corporations. The sort of unaccountability in accusing a distraught
policy-holder of mass murder (even without noticing that she had no record of
violence and not even a gun!) and being willing to put her in prison for fourteen
years, likely to send the public a message from the large corporations, is
consistent with the lack of accountability generally on market participants that
are so large and wealthy that even competition is stifled that so enrages
consumers and thus prompts anti-corporate politics. The connection can be found
in Adam Smith’s claim that one of the main rationales for government is to
protect the wealthy from the poor, who would otherwise steal the wealth. Does
this hold of the governments in the U.S., or is the public to be served? The
official answer may differ from the real answer.
That the governments in the U.S.
have allowed companies to become so large as to choke competition without
anti-trust law being enforced—something that Adam Smith would not like—is yet
another indication of the “under the table” power of large corporations in the
United States, thanks in part to unlimited political campaign contributions
being legal. Perhaps elected officials were the people delivering the
instructions from the health insurance company to the Pennsylvania sheriff in
Altoona: Be rough with the guy and don’t let him speak to the media. Push him
up against a wall if you want. Grab him by the neck. Show the world what
happens if someone goes up against corporate America. Hence the anti-corporate political movement
in a democracy that is premised on accountability rather than plutocracy
with impunity.
My main point is that
institutionally, or structurally, very large and wealthy private companies,
whether corporations or privately held, are incompatible with not only market
competition, which ensures fair prices (even at grocery stores after a
pandemic), but also political democracy, wherein one person has one vote and
thus is just as important as the next. Whether a man on the street or a
corporate CEO is murdered, the police-response should be the same in terms of
the cost and effort in the manhunt and how the suspects are treated. Innocent
until proven guilty means that police violence against a suspect who is not
being violent or resistant is itself a crime regardless of how rich the
victim’s family or company happens to be.
The case of the health insurance
CEO’s murder in December, 2024 was deliberately not supposed to be a vehicle
for getting an anti-corporate message out—with even violence being used to
enforce this proscription—but how the Pennsylvania police aggressively treated
the suspect unabashedly in public view can be seen as a poster
advertising the interlarding of corporate power at the expense of
accountability in American democracy. Both economically and politically, it can
be asked whether large corporations are accountable in the United States;
politically, the same question may be asked of the local police departments in
the member states. The American governments in the U.S. could do worse than
apply anti-trust law to a variety of markets and apply criminal law to local
police departments whose actual paymasters can be characterized proverbially as
the man behind the curtain—an allusion to the hidden Wizard in the film, The
Wizard of Oz. Then again, perhaps Mr. Smith Goes to Washington is a
more pertinent film, as the senator played by Jimmy Stuart filibusters for
hours and hours against corruption in his home state.
1. Jessica Parker and Nadine Yousif, “Luigi Mangione
Fingerprints Match Crime-Scene Prints, Police Say,” BBC.com, December 11,
2024.
2. Pocharapon Neammanee, “
Woman Arrested After Saying ‘Delay, Deny, Depose’ On Call With Insurance Company,” The Huffington Post, December 12, 2024.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.
5.Ibid.
