The home of the boss of the US’s largest health insurance company was hit with bomb threats hours after he was sh0t d£ad outside a New York City hotel.
Roughly 12 hours after UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was k!lled, police investigated bomb threats to his home in Maple Grove, Minnesota, according to a police report obtained by The New York Times on Thursday afternoon.
The state bomb squad was called to search two residences in the suburbs and did not find further evidence or explosives.
It is not yet clear as at press time if the threats were connected to the assassination on Wednesday morning.
Thompson was shot in front of the Hilton’s address around 6.40am and was pronounced dead at a nearby hospital, according to the NYPD.
CCTV footage obtained by The New York Times showed the chilling moment that a suspect appeared on a sidewalk behind Thompson, who was wearing a blue suit and walking calmly towards the Hilton hotel. The gunman points a firearm at Thompson’s back.
Thompson seems to first be wounded in the calf and is also shot in the back. He takes a couple of steps and looks back at the suspect, then drops to the ground.
Another person walking near Thompson is seen running.
The gunman steps toward Thompson while pointing the gun at him, then walks in the other direction and starts running as he reaches the street.
On Thursday morning, Thompson’s suspected killer was pictured smiling as a manhunt for him continued.
New photos released by police showed the suspect smiling under a gray hooded jacket, a different outfit than what he donned at the time of the shooting a day prior.
They are the first images captured of the suspect without a mask.
It was not clear where the images were taken.
Law enforcement sources are looking to obtain a search warrant for a facility in New York City where the gunman may be hiding, sources told ABC News.
Investigators were also looking into a gun purchase in Connecticut with the firearm resembling the one used in the shooting, two officials told The Times.
New York Mayor Eric Adams said investigators are ‘on the right pathway’ and recovering ‘pieces to the puzzle’ as the manhunt entered the second day.
‘We feel that we’re moving at a steady pace, and we’re going to have someone apprehended,’ said Adams.
‘In all of my years of law enforcement, I have never seen a silencer before and so that was really something that was shocking to us all.’
The brazen murder of Brian Thompson, CEO of UnitedHealthcare, has shocked the business world and sparked a flurry of theories about the reasons behind his death.
The 50-year-old was shot in the back and leg outside the New York Hilton Hotel in Midtown, near Times Square and Central Park, on Wednesday morning.
Police sources said that casings were discovered at the scene with cryptic messages left on them.
Surveillance Cameras captured his assailant – who is on the run walking up behind the businessman and killing him in cold blood.
Police said the words ‘deny,’ ‘defend’ and ‘depose’ were discovered on bullets at the scene of a shooting in Midtown Manhattan.
The meaning of the words etched onto the bullet casings is alleged to reference a book slamming insurance companies in America.
A 2010 book by insurance law expert Professor Jay M Fienman was titled ‘Delay, Deny, Defend: Why Insurance Companies Don’t Pay Claim and What You Can Do About’.