NYPD believes UnitedHealthcare CEO assassin left New York City on a bus morning of shooting

NEW YORK – The masked gunman wanted in connection with the ambush shooting death of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson Wednesday morning fled the crime scene using various modes of transportation before police believe he got on a bus out of the Big Apple, authorities told Fox News.

Police traced his route from the crime scene near 54th Street and Sixth Avenue up to Central Park, which he exited at 77th Street and Central Park West, Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny told Fox News Friday.

Kenny's boss, new NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch, added that investigators have picked up an abundance of video and digital evidence in addition to physical evidence they hope can lead them to the killer.

"We actually have a tremendous amount of forensic evidence in this case that we've collected-  DNA evidence, fingerprint evidence, which is all at the lab now being processed," she told Fox News Friday. 

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That could include a sample from a drink the killer discarded near the scene and a dropped burner phone, which police recovered a few steps away.

He walked with the bike to Columbus Avenue and then ditched it in favor of a taxi, which he took to an uptown bus terminal, where investigators found video of him entering about an hour after the murder.

He entered the park wearing a backpack and emerged without it, prompting the NYPD to spend most of Friday searching for evidence. They found the backpack over the weekend, reportedly stuffed full of Monopoly money, and sent dive teams to ponds in the park.

Authorities are now conducting an interstate manhunt for the suspect, whose identity has not been made public.

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Kenny said the suspect arrived in New York about 10 days before the murder and that there is only one person of interest in the case. He is believed to have ridden to New York City on a Greyhound bus that departed Atlanta the day before Thanksgiving. He checked into a hostel on the Upper West Side using a fake ID and paying in cash – but police were able to obtain an unmasked image of their person of interest from a lobby surveillance camera in the building.

"Our goal in all of this is to bring closure to the family and bring and bring justice to the family, but people have to realize this isn't a television show," he said. "We're not going to solve this in 60 minutes. This is going to be painstakingly done. We have to do it right. Eventually, we're gonna have to present this case, in front of a judge and a jury. So we're taking our time at this point, and we're going to connect the dots, and we will make this arrest."

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He said it was too soon to allege a motive but acknowledged that the suspect did leave potential clues behind.

"We're not going to commit to a motive right now, but, you know, obviously when you look at the writing, you look at the victim's employment, you know, it could possibly be a disgruntled employee or a disgruntled client, but we're not we're not ruling that out, but we certainly not committing to it at this time," Kenny said.

The killer left behind casings with handwritten words on them, "depose," "deny" and "defend," drawing comparisons to the book "Delay, Deny, Defend: Why Insurance Companies Don't Pay Claims and What You Can Do About It" – speculation swirled that the slaying may have grown out of resentment for a denied claim.

Criminal profiler John Kelly, who says he lost money on a business venture involving a smaller firm that relied on UnitedHealthcare, tells Fox News Digital he believes the masked assassin was motivated by either "revenge or money."

He believes a massive hack in February, which Reuters reported impacted 100 million Americans, could have been a factor in the case for victims who suffered personal and financial setbacks as a result. 

In addition to the hack, customers have another reason to be angry with UnitedHealthcare, Kelly said.

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A class action lawsuit alleges that the company routinely wrongfully denied elderly patients care it owed them under its Medicate Advantage plans by overriding human doctors with an AI model that had a 90% error rate.

"Despite the high error rate, Defendants continue to systemically deny claims using their flawed AI model because they know that only a tiny minority of policyholders (roughly 0.2%) will appeal denied claims, and the vast majority will either pay out-of-pocket costs or forgo the remainder of their prescribed post-acute care," the lawsuit alleges.

The civil case remains ongoing, as does the hunt for the killer.

The NYPD is offering a $10,000 reward in the case, asking the public to call the Crime Stoppers hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477). You can also submit a tip via their website. All calls are kept confidential.