Brian Thompson: Police say gunman who killed UnitedHealth insurance CEO has left NYC
New York City police believe the man who fatally shot a UnitedHealth top executive has left the city, as the hunt for the gunman passed the crucial 48-hour mark.
Brian Thompson, 50, the CEO of UnitedHealth’s insurance unit, was shot in the back on Wednesday in what police described as a targeted attack.
Police released multiple photos of the suspect — who fled the scene, climbed on an electric bicycle and disappeared into Central Park — and have asked the public for help in tracking him down.
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But Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch on Friday said in an interview with CNN that authorities now believe he has left the city, after new video footage emerged.
New York Police Department Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny, in the same interview, said the footage shows the suspect climbing into a taxi that took him to the Port Authority bus station.
“We have video of him entering the Port Authority Bus Terminal. We don’t have any video of him exiting so we believe he may have gotten on a bus,” he said.
“Those buses are interstate buses. That’s why we believe he may have left New York City.”
The expanded hunt comes after security experts cautioned that the first 48-hours after such a crime is the best window of opportunity to catch a gunman, a timeframe that has now passed.
Police believe the suspect arrived in New York 10 days before the shooting on a Greyhound bus that originated in Atlanta, and checked into a Manhattan youth hostel using a fake ID from New Jersey, several media outlets reported. Reuters has not independently verified this account.
Police offered a $US10,000 ($A15,000) reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction. UnitedHealth is the largest US health insurer, providing benefits to tens of millions of Americans, who pay more for healthcare than people in any other country.
Thompson joined UnitedHealth in 2004 and became the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, a unit of UnitedHealth Group, in April 2021. Following the attack, UnitedHealth and several other health insurers including CVS Health and Centene took down pictures of executives from their corporate websites in an apparent tightening of security measures.
Centene said on Thursday it would no longer hold an in-person investor day next week, and that the event would be streamed.
The words “deny,” “defend” and “depose” were carved into shell casings found at the scene, police sources told ABC and the New York Post. A New York City Police Department spokesperson would not comment on the report.
The words evoke the title of Jay Feinman’s 2010 book critical of the insurance industry Delay Deny Defend: Why Insurance Companies Don’t Pay Claims and What You Can Do About It.
Detectives believe the perpetrator was experienced with firearms based on how he slowly and deliberately carried out the shooting, CNN reported, citing police sources who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the investigation was ongoing.
Security video showed the shooter, wearing a hooded sweatshirt, ski mask and a grey backpack, walking up behind Thompson, raising his handgun fitted with a silcencer and firing at his back. Police said the gunman arrived outside the hotel several minutes before Thompson and waited for him to walk past before firing, ignoring other passers-by.
CNN, whose reporter John Miller is a former NYPD deputy commissioner, said police found a phone in an alley that the gunman ran through and also recovered a water bottle the shooter bought just minutes before the attack.
A fingerprint on the water bottle was too smudged to provide further clues about the shooter, the New York Times reported, citing a senior law enforcement official.
