Investigators believe the person who fatally shot UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson outside a Midtown Manhattan hotel earlier this week “could possibly be a disgruntled employee or a disgruntled client,” according to NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny.
“This isn’t ‘Blue Bloods,’” Kenny said at a press conference on Friday, referring to a popular TV show starring Tom Selleck. “We’re not going to solve this in 60 minutes. We’re painstakingly going through every bit of evidence that we can come across.”
Kenny said the three words etched into rounds and shell casings found at the crime scene – “delay,” “deny,” and “depose” – suggested the shooter’s possible motive. They appear to reference a 2010 book by Rutgers Law professor Jay Feinman, Delay, Deny, Defend: Why Insurance Companies Don’t Pay Claims and What You Can Do About It. (Feinman declined to comment when reached by The Independent.)
The “net is closing in” on the as-yet unidentified gunman, New York City Mayor Eric Adams, himself a former NYPD captain, said Saturday.
Still, cops have so far been unable to locate or identify the suspect, whose distinctive grey backpack was found Friday evening along the shooter’s escape route through Central Park, a full three days after Thompson was shot dead.
Police have so far gathered a “huge amount” of clues, including fingerprints, DNA, and video footage of the suspect’s movements from surveillance cameras mounted throughout the city, NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch told CNN.
Police think the suspect may have killed Thompson with a veterinary gun, a near-silent nine-millimeter firearm used by farmers and ranchers to put down livestock, according to Kenny.
“It’s a weapon commonly used on farms and ranches. If an animal has to get put down, the animal can be shot without causing a loud noise,” Kenny said.
At the same time, the brazen killing of Thompson, a 50-year-old father of two, has been celebrated by many Americans who blame the health insurance industry writ large, and UnitedHealthcare in particular, for prioritizing profits over people. Multiple singer-songwriters have posted murder ballads lionizing the shooter as he continues to evade capture.
“I want to have sympathy for the family of Brian Thompson — and I think about that,” one told The Independent.
“And then I also think about the thousands of people who’ve lost loved ones, or who are up to their neck in medical debt. And I think people understand at a fundamental level that nobody should be essentially killed for being poor. It’s a very sort of callous reaction, but in a lot of ways it’s justified.”
The suspect arrived in New York City on a Greyhound bus that originated in Atlanta, police said, but they don’t know precisely where he boarded. After shooting Thompson, the masked shooter then fled on an electric bicycle, rode through Central Park to the Upper West side, then hailed a cab which took him to the Port Authority’s George Washington Bridge Bus Station in the Washington Heights section of Upper Manhattan, police said. Since the suspect was not seen exiting the bus station, investigators believe he left town by bus, as well.
NYPD officials said they are working now to rule out a tip that the suspect left New York by plane. Customs and border patrol agencies on both sides of the Mexican and Canadian borders have also been advised to be on the lookout for the suspect in case he tries to leave the country, a law enforcement source told CNN.
The NYPD put up a $10,000 reward for information leading to the suspect’s arrest, and has fielded countless numbers of tips, authorities said. The Atlanta Police Department is now assisting with the investigation, as is the FBI, which is offering a $50,000 reward of its own.
