AN URGENT manhunt is underway as police released new video of a suspect in the fatal stabbing of a grad student at an up-scale furniture store.

Brianna Kupfer was working at the store on Thursday when a man wandered into the shop and attacked her, The Los Angeles Police Department said.

It happened in broad daylight, at 1.50pm, before a customer found the 24-year-old's body on the ground inside the store and called police.

New surveillance video from LAPD's homicide unit showed the suspect in Ms Kupfer's murder at a 7-Eleven store approximately 30 minutes after her killing.

The man in a dark hoodie, sunglasses, and a white N-95 mask is seen walking into the store with a black backpack and interacting with the store clerk.

Police are searching for the man as detectives work to uncover what led to the grad student's violent death.

'NO KNOWN MOTIVE'

Police said Ms Kupfer was working at the Croft House furniture store in Los Angeles alone on January 13 when the suspect stabbed her, then left through a back door.

More surveillance video showed the suspect walking calmly through an alley near the rear of the crime scene moments after the killing.

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LAPD detectives said it doesn't appear Ms Kupfer knew the suspect, who investigators believe is homeless.

City leaders and private donors have raised $250,000 for information leading to an arrest, The Independent reported.

It's one of the largest rewards in recent memory, LAPD told local ABC reporter John Haskell.

VICTIM'S FATHER SPEAKS OUT

Ms Kupfer grew up in the Pacific Palisades near Santa Monica and graduated from the University of Miami before returning to California to study design at the University of California, Los Angeles.

She had worked at the furniture store part-time as a consultant for about a year, her father Todd Kupfer told Fox News.

He said it was unusual that she was alone in the store with no other employees around at the time of the attack.

Mr Kupfer described his daughter as strong and vivacious, and the kind of person "we need on this earth."

He said she was focused and ambitious, with a bucket list she kept on her phone that mapped out travel and life plans.

"She was a kind soul and always was trying to make herself better and everything around her better," Mr Kupfer said. "She cared about people."

Her 21-year-old sister is "completely broken" over the loss, he said.

"They were best friends," Mr Kupfer told Fox News. "She is not doing well."

CONCERNS ABOUT CRIME

As Ms Kupfer's three siblings and parents await answers in her violent death, her father is slamming recent crime in the Los Angeles area.

The murder rate has soared and violent crime has touched even the city's wealthiest areas in recent years, Fox News reported.

"Crime is truly spiking, and we have a lot of criminals on the streets that shouldn’t be out," Todd Kupfer told the news outlet.

He called for more action from politicians so no other family is faced with losing their loved one.

"We have a lot of politicians that somehow forgot about people and think the key to getting elected is to support the lowest rung of our society and to give them rights and somehow that’s the answer to getting votes," he said.

"We need to champion [my daughter] as a beacon of what's wrong and make sure that people recognize that – because it could be their children next, and it's just an impossible price to pay."

Anyone with information about the attack on Ms Kupfer was asked to contact LAPD's West Bureau Homicide investigators at 213-382-9470.

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