By Rich McKay and Daniel Trotta
(Reuters) – New York City police believe the man who fatally shot a UnitedHealth executive has left the city, Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said on Friday, as the hunt for the gunman passed the crucial 48-hour mark.
Brian Thompson, 50, the CEO of UnitedHealth’s insurance division, was shot in the back Wednesday in what police described as a targeted attack. Police have released several photos of the suspect – who fled, hopped on an electric bicycle and disappeared into Central Park – and have asked the public for help in locating him.
Investigators recovered a backpack they believe belongs to the suspect in Central Park on Friday, CNN reported, citing unnamed police sources. The discarded backpack, possibly loaded with evidence, was missed on the first pass but found in a subsequent, extensive search of the 341-acre park, according to CNN.
Tisch said in an interview with CNN earlier on Friday that authorities now believe he has left New York City after new video emerged showing him arriving at a bus station.
New York Police Department Chief Joseph Kenny said in the same interview that the video shows the suspect getting into a taxi that took him to a Port Authority bus station near the George Washington Bridge in upper Manhattan.
“Those buses are interstate buses. That’s why we think he left New York City,” Kenny said.
The expanded hunt comes after security experts warned that the first 48 hours after such a crime are the best chance to catch a shooter, a time frame that has now passed.
Felipe Rodriguez, a former NYPD detective and adjunct professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, said solving the case is like putting together a difficult puzzle.
“You start at the edges first and work your way in, but right now they may not have all the pieces. But things are moving forward,” Rodriguez said.
Police have not yet identified the suspect, at least not publicly. They believe he arrived in New York 10 days before the shooting on a Greyhound bus leaving from Atlanta and checked into a youth hostel in Manhattan using a fake ID from New Jersey, several media outlets reported. Reuters has not independently verified this account.
The New York City Police Department offered a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) offered a reward of up to $50,000 for this.
SAFETY MEASURES
UnitedHealth is the largest U.S. health insurer, providing benefits to tens of millions of Americans, who pay more for health care than people in any other country.
Thompson joined UnitedHealth in 2004 and became CEO of UnitedHealthcare, part of UnitedHealth Group (NYSE:) in April 2021.
Following the attack, UnitedHealth and several other health insurers, including CVS Health (NYSE 🙂 and Centene (NYSE:) have removed photos of executives from their company websites in an apparent tightening of security measures.
Centene said late Thursday that 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 several media outlets. A spokesperson for the New York City Police Department declined to comment on the report.
The words evoke the title of Jay Feinman’s 2010 book criticizing the insurance industry: “Delay Deny Defend: Why Insurance Companies Don’t Pay Claims and What You Can Do About It.”
Feinman, a professor emeritus at Rutgers University Law School, declined to comment.
Detectives believe the perpetrator had experience with firearms, based on the way he carried out the shooting slowly and deliberately, CNN reported, citing police sources who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation was still ongoing.
Surveillance video showed the gunman, wearing a hooded jacket, ski mask and gray backpack, walking up behind Thompson, raising his silenced pistol and firing into his back. Police said the gunman arrived outside the hotel several minutes before Thompson and waited for him to walk by before firing, ignoring other passersby.
Before the backpack report, CNN, whose reporter John Miller is a former deputy commissioner of the NYPD, said police had found a phone in an alley through which the shooter ran and also recovered a water bottle that the shooter held just a few moments ago. minutes before the attack.
Miller said the best photo of the suspect’s face was taken when the man lowered his balaclava at the request of a hostel receptionist in a flirtatious moment when she asked to see his face.
“He lowers the mask and smiles broadly. That little flirt between the two in a good-natured way actually provided the key clue to identifying him,” Miller said.
